Our previous newsletter reported on the city's plan to create bike lanes on Annette St. as part of the overall Toronto Bike Plan - and on what we considered at the time to be an unacceptable "compromise" supported by Councillor Saundercook to reroute a significant segment of these lanes to St. Johns Rd.

You may recall that the only public consultation on the Annette lanes was a barely publicized Open House in April at which some Annette businesses, concerned about some loss of on-street parking, expressed loud objections to the bike lane proposal. As a result of that poorly attended meeting, the Councillor announced he would be supporting a diversion of the designated bike lanes on Annette to a 'signed route' on St. Johns Rd. between Runnymede and Jane Streets.

We were concerned about this recommendation for several reasons. First, it was invalid as it was based on utterly inadequate consultation. Secondly, it is illogical and unrealistic because it suggests that cyclists should needlessly divert their most expedient routes. Basically, cycling routes should be straight and consistent, and not be needlessly diverted north, south, east and west.

Thirdly, we believe it is more dangerous for cyclists to travel on 'signed routes' vs designated lanes, regardless of the logic behind the route itself. And finally, abandonment of the Annette lanes will not auger well for the continued implementation of the bike network across the city. A decision to abandon the Annette St bike lane proposal could have a major negative effect on the long-term success of Toronto's ambitious - but to-date unrealized - Bike Plan. If bile lanes cannot exist on a relatively un-busy commercial strip like Annette St., then where do we go from here?

Fortunately, we were not alone in our concerns. The June 4 Public Works and Infrastructure Committee meeting that considered Annette among other bike lane proposals heard from many people who shared our issues - enough that the Saundercook/St. Johns proposal seems to have been taken off the table. See http://www.world19.com/bike_comments.htm for many of the comments sent to the Committee which were copied to world19. Our deputation is also posted there.

The Committee voted to support all four bike lane proposals on the agenda that day, including Dupont/Annette from Lansdowne to Runnymede. Regarding the Runnymede to Jane stretch, the Committee "requested the General Manager, Transportation Services to meet with the local Councillor and various community groups (e.g., residents, local Business Improvement Areas, churches and cyclists) and report to the meeting of the Public Works and Infrastructure Committee on October 10, 2008, on installing the missing section of the bike lane on Annette Street between Jane Street and Runnymede Road, consistent with the City of Toronto Bike Plan".

We were very encouraged to see the large number of people who agreed that both the process, and the flawed recommendation (reported as a "done deal" in The Villager -- and see our response in the links below) were unacceptable, and we were very happy that the PWIC saw this too.

world19 is continuing to work on this issue, together with the Toronto Cyclists Union, and other local residents. We have requested a copy of the original parking study and proposed parking plan developed by city staff to ensure that we're all working from the same page. We are sympathetic to and supportive of local businesses and hope to work with them and others to move forward. However, we also feel very strongly that in order to build an extensive, safe and efficient bike network through the city, streets like Annette must be part of that network.

We will continue to provide updates.

Additional note: the only notification from Councillor Saundercook that we are aware of regarding the bike lanes was an odd flyer, dated May 2 that apologized "for the poor notification delivery regarding a meeting held on April 17th". It stated that the bike route "will" use St. Johns Rd. There was no mention of the fact that the issue would be discussed and voted on at the Public Works Committee and later at City Council. We can only hope that the next public consultations which the Committee directed him to hold on this issue are a little more public.  That notice is posted on our website http://world19.com/may2_bikenotice.doc. In addition, his website noted that this is bike month and encouraged people to cycle. The only mention of bike lanes is in the comments section, where a number of people urged him to support the full Annette Bike Lane.

LINKS:

• PWIC decision (PDF)

• City background document (PDF)

• The June 5 Toronto Star carried an article about the meeting.

• Our letter, printed in the May 30 Villager in response to the previous week's Villager article (and another letter  as well).

See more general bike links at the bottom of the page. 

Annette St. Bike Lanes: a background

An Annette St. bike route would be an excellent -- and seemingly easy -- step on the route to completing the Toronto Bike Plan. Connecting with Dupont and Baby Point, it would be a straight (and almost flat!) east-west route across the west end of the city right through to the Humber River, and would connect with numerous north-south bike routes. Annette St. is scheduled for long-overdue resurfacing this year, which makes the creation of the bike lanes simple and timely.

However, because of the narrowness of the road, approximately half of the parking spaces must be eliminated to accommodate the lanes. The City transportation engineer in charge of this project said Annette would be unique in his experience: the first such street with any significant commercial properties that would require eliminating substantial parking to accommodate bike lanes. (In fact, we feel that Harbord St., between Major and Ossington is very similar, without quite the commercial concentration on the Annette block east of Jane).

Plans for the Annette lanes were presented at an Open House on April 17, however there was almost no publicity for the meeting. Most people heard about it via word of mouth, either via the cycling community, or by a flyer circulated among local business owners, who were concerned about the potential impact to their businesses related to the loss of parking.

The meeting was very thinly attended, and by reports we've heard, not well organized. The largest group were the store owners who strongly objected both because of the parking issue, and their expectation of delivery problems.

Almost a month after the meeting, Ward 13 Councillor Bill Saundercook circulated a flyer in the Annette St. area, announcing he was supporting an alternate plan: to divert the bike route north to St. Johns Rd. between Runnymede and Jane Streets because of the potential impact to Annette St. businesses.

A highly misleading article about the situation was printed in the May 23 Villager, entitled, "City changes concept for proposed bike lanes in response to community uproar". We -- along with the new Toronto Cyclists Union -- responded in a letter published in the May 30 issue (along with another letter in agreement with our points).