The Dumbest Bike Lane Law Just Passed in Canada [video]
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The video criticizes recent legislation passed by the conservative government in Ontario, Canada, which mandates cities to get provincial approval before installing or altering bicycle lanes. The legislation also aims to remove existing bike lanes, particularly targeting Toronto. The Ontario Premier, Doug Ford, defends these moves by claiming that bike lanes cause significant traffic congestion, a statement the video creator refutes by presenting data showing minimal road coverage by bike lanes and negligible travel time differences. The video also highlights studies indicating that bike lanes contribute to business growth and increased safety, contrary to the government's stance.
The narrator argues that this legislation serves as a distraction from larger, unresolved issues in Ontario, such as healthcare, housing, and transportation, exacerbated under Ford's leadership. They suggest that Ford's focus on bike lanes is a politically motivated maneuver to rally suburban car-dependent voters by scapegoating cyclists, while ignoring the broader benefits of viable transportation alternatives. The video concludes by urging viewers to resist the legislation through advocacy and political engagement.
And Doug Ford can't claim that it won't work in Toronto because it worked in Montreal.
Two other notes: people don’t survey bike traffic and often underestimate it because bicyclists are quiet and take up far less space. Similarly, small business owners famously underestimate how many customers walk, use transit, or bike because if they personally drive they assume everyone else does, too, and it’s a tempting target for blaming every problem on because it means they don’t have to change any of their decisions. This has played out multiple times where I live where it’s the bike lane conspiracy scaring away their customers, never Walmart or the pandemic, even if other businesses blocks away from the bike lanes had the same problem.
None of that says your city can’t have done something stupid, of course, but I’d look for harder data rather than trusting anything “everyone knows”.
You are an car driver. There are car lanes and tank lanes. the car lanes are less than a percent of the tank lanes. Regulary people die, because a tank driver overlooked a car, car lanes are often obstructed by parking tanks. Nobody but an minority of car drivers care. In newspapers often the car drivers get the blame when an accident happens if they are reported, often even deadly accidents are unreported or just an small note.
Car driving in the Netherlands is far superior to driving in Toronto. Once Toronto gets to the bike lane saturation that Dutch cities have, we might be close to reaching the point where more bike lanes make things worse rather than better.
We recently got a bike lane near me. It is about a half mile long. There is little housing or shopping along it.
It doesn't radically impact traffic, because it was carved out of a turn lane, used for the few shops that are there. It's mostly business-to-business stuff, so it's not very busy. It does, however, mean that the bike lane requires a lot of marking, because it's right next to the travel lanes, and there are accesses through the bike lane to those shops. I have never seen a bicycle on it.
I am a big fan of bike lanes. This looks like a pilot project designed to discredit them. "Hey, we installed a bike lane and it turns out nobody uses it."
Whatever authorized that, that is the dumbest law.
Bike path does have a positive impact when they are well designed but more expensive than a painted line and doesn’t create more km to brag for politicians. Their asphalt quality is very often way inferior than the lane sharing the car road, making them bumpy, sloppy and/or deteriorate fast.
My recommandation for safety is to play with visibility : wear bright and flashy colors and drive in the middle of the road, especially before turns, crossing or narrow places. I’m not an asshole though and let cars overpass when it’s secure, but wouldn’t trust others for my security.
Roads should be used for maximum benefit to the public. That sometimes includes bike lanes, but from what I've seen, should not include rarely used lanes in poor parts of town for the benefit of a few people doing exercise at the expense of the actual residents ability to drive and park.