Dear Editor:
I was happy to see the recent legislation introduced by the province to provide oversight to adding bike lanes in towns and cities across Ontario.
While the initial focus will be on cities that have removed traffic lanes to add bike lanes, this will hopefully bring a much needed pause and perhaps have our municipal council utilize some common sense to decisions on where bike lanes should be added in the future.
If you have been near St. David Street between St. Andrew and Garafraxa Streets lately, you can see how adding bike lanes along this stretch is going to affect this roadway. This design was approved by our previous council but is also supported by our current council, despite a survey showing only 15.6% of respondents (104 people) were in favour of adding bike lanes and despite that more than 1,000 local residents signed a petition asking council to “not add bike lanes on a provincial highway.”
It remains to be seen how much these new bike lanes will be utilized and how much this new road design will impact traffic.
But it is confirmed in the township’s “master transportation plan” that separated bike lanes will end at St. Andrew Street and there are no plans to continue these any further at this time.
Based on this, secondary roads would have been the better option to add bike lanes across town to connect our trails and to route cyclists to local shops and schools.
I hope this latest development gives our own council “pause for thought” so they can make the right decisions concerning the future of active transportation in our community.
Edward O’Shaughnessy,
Fergus