Cycle Toronto

face a government that's also hostile to anything that is not a car.

With us to discuss where things stand now and what happens next are Michael Longfield, the executive director of the advocacy organization Cycle Toronto, and Bronwyn Rowe, who's an attorney with Ecojustice.

That's a nonprofit law organization, and she is part of the team that's been leading the legal fight against the provincial government.

Michael Bronwyn, welcome to The War on Cars.

They quickly rewrote the legislation while it was in committee and basically made it to remove 19 kilometers in bike lanes.

The three main arterials, arguably the spine of Toronto Cycling Network along Bloor Street, University and Yonge Street.

There was a big campaign launched by Cycle Toronto, a petition that received 25,000 signatures or more, tens of thousands of submissions to the province against the legislation.

But they have a majority.

But I'm just gonna throw something at you and wonder perhaps what we've seen in terms of how the city of Toronto has, uh, changed over the last little while.

Now, this is a poll done by EKOS, and it was released by Cycle Toronto, so maybe that says something there.

But their general response was a poll for EKOS, uh, general support for protected bike lanes in Toronto was at 70 to 78% from respondents, but that was in mid-2025.

Uh, how does that compare to your numbers, and what do you think we've seen over the past couple of years that have changed people's opinions?

Very useful poll today as we try to figure out what's going on in this election.

Thank you very much for your time.

John is, uh, correct to point out that, uh, this poll that I cited, uh, different methodology, different polling group, and also sponsored by Cycle Toronto, which might have had its thumb on the scale there.

When I said you go back and you look at that one, it's 78% response, uh, of the city of Toronto, uh, needs to do more to protect vulnerable road users and 70% in favor of bike lanes.

[laughs]

And, uh, right now, Cycle Toronto, uh, versus Attorney General of Canada, it's a great read.

If anybody who is not a lawyer is interested in reading a case, look it up.

Um, it's an, it's an excellent read.

However, the appeal court ruling has now paved the way for the removal to begin next week.

The cycling advocacy group CycleTO responded to the news and they released a statement which reads in part, ripping out these protected bike lanes against the will of Toronto City Council is a colossal waste of $48 million.

The province's own experts know it will not ease traffic congestion.

It will put people's lives at risk and there's no network of side streets that could replace these lanes.

These aforementioned interviews.

I'm your co-host, Dave Gray-Donald, and I am joined today by Michael Longfield, Executive Director of Cycle Toronto.

Welcome, Michael.

Welcome.

And then usually every bike lane project gets voted on at council twice.

So it gets voted on once kind of like in principle, we approve staff exploring building this bike lane.

And that'll now staff to go away, have budget, have resources, start doing the designs, talking with counselors, having public consultations, engaging with the DIAs to try to determine what should the bike lane do? How should it prioritize parking and loading zones and spaces for cafes and crosswalks and signal timing and turn lanes all these other very detailed things as part of the designs so by this current process there's no sense at all and how it when these things are reconfigured to restore the travel lanes how any of those decisions will be determined and who will make the final call and so i know there are you know some businesses who maybe feel like you know they weren't consulted or if they were consulted their um uh you know preferred uh options weren't necessarily implemented but based on this provincial process they're gonna have even less say over how this is uh being done so um you know i think on two levels one of the things that we've really been highlighting from cycle toronto's perspective you know from the two years this legislation was first announced is This isn't just about bike lanes.

It really is about this idea of the province undermining local democracy.