Pretty shocking that we have something like this in Markham. Not often do you see a suburb have this much foot traffic at once. Cars aren't fully banned here but at least the lanes are narrow enough not to speed through it. The most important part is there is no on-street parking.
Why does it seem like anything to improve the quality of life or safety of bikes is met with a ton of controversy? In our society, we have pedestrian infrastructure (sidewalks). We have car infrastructure (most roads + highways). We have sort of have transit infrastructure (subways, streetcars/LRTs, and bus lanes more recently). But yet bike infrastructure is on maybe less than 0.5% of all Toronto roads. And I say 0.5% because Doug Ford himself released a 1991 stat that only 1% of people bike to work. Yet even if that's actually the case 35 years later, the bike infrastructure that all of Toronto has doesn't even scale up correctly.
Driving doesn't seem politicized as almost everyone on every political spectrum can agree that cars, to varying extents, are essential to our every day life. We have sidewalks almost everywhere yet nobody wishes they should be removed nor should pedestrians be forced into traffic. We also have transit infrastructure and sure it does get some politicization but it's nowhere close to the same extent as bikes. We do have the IntegrityTO rhetoric with bus lanes but for the most part, the support for bus lanes is very high. Yet it's crazy to think how many local downtown residents that bike a lot don't want bike lanes of any kind.
Now this extends to drivers intentionally blocking bike lanes or driving onto them. Why does it seem like more drivers respect bus lanes than bike lanes? Or even jumping the curb parking on sidewalks. Why is that rarely done? Yet we recently saw a driver out of spite, blocking a bike lane and using right wing political rhetoric.
And look at the Balance on Bloor. If Bloor St didn't build bike lanes but instead just doubled the width of the sidewalks according to the bike lanes (and even converted this to mixed-use path), would this petition have been a thing? Did Doug Ford literally create all kinds of bike lane bills just to spite cyclists rather than think about pedestrians' safety? I'm willing to bet his speed camera ban is just so he can ensure drivers will run over cyclists. Just look at this comment. It sums up the resentment towards bike lanes. It's more of a political motivation rather than solving traffic congestion.
And so just yesterday, there was a thread on r/Toronto showing a "No Bikes on Sidewalk" sticker. It's gotten many heated arguments about whether cyclists should be allowed onto sidewalks. Yet nobody talks about how extremely narrow those downtown sidewalks are. A person in a wheel chair, a 12 year old riding by themselves, and a runner can barely pass pedestrians; all of which are legally allowed to use sidewalks. At times, it feels like tippy-toeing. There are garbage days where residential roads have garbage bins blocking sidewalks because it's so damn narrow. Whereby the cars have quite a ton of space, even for just 1 parking lane and/or 1 driving lane. It would make a Dutch tourist lose their brain cells.
I'm really curious as to whether the so-called 'pedestrians' in that thread actually care about their own safety against bikes. Or are they making those comments to dunk on cyclists? Because I'm thinking the latter. There's literally no discussion about the lack of width a sidewalk has nor are they mentioning about how drivers that block the box are far worse to their own safety.
It seems like some buses have windows designed like this where you can't seem to pull it open for some reason.
Driving has never been something I really wanted to do, since I live in Toronto where I could get TTC access. And I was always an anxious person. That was why I didn't really start driving until a few years ago.
Back in late-2016, I passed the written test for the G1. I never touched the wheel after passing it. It would've expired in 2021 but due to Covid, everything got pushed back indefinitely. In mid-2022, I would start to really take driving seriously. I would pass my G2 license. It then displayed that it would expire in late-2026. I did practice a bit of driving at first post-G2 but it slowly faded over time because other things got in the way with life. I didn't have my own car to get around. Unfortunately, time flew by so quickly to the point where I procrastinated. As such, I don't see myself being G-test-ready by the expiry date unless I really cram everything.
Is it possible for me to extend my expiring G2 license by another 5 years? I heard you could pay $90 for that? Or do I have to actually pass my G test before late-2026 (otherwise restart)?
Link to the video.
A driver ran a red light at a fairly fast speed and hit her. She is lucky to be alive but she may never be able to walk properly again, let alone walk.
Found this on my Facebook feed. Hopefully this is not some AI slop. But either way, I did some Google Maps and I was shocked that downtown Whitby has a bunch of those stores that look like downtown Toronto. Yet if you look at bike infrastructure wow it's really lagging behind.