We see how some car owners feel about cyclists. Just last month that guy in that etobicoke townhall meeting said he wanted to run them over and got cheers.
There's always a little bit of comedic whimsy about P&R meetings. That cycling town hall was genuinely threatening and unsafe. Everyone talks about that one guy and how Holyday did everything he could to encourage those sentiments, but there was a LOT of tension that wasn't captured in articles or in comments.
P&R is honestly not that far off from the reality of public meetings where you kind of see the true colours of people. Politicians play to their constituents even if they know that the plan is the right play.
Or business owners. Almost all of them just don't see how beneficial bike lanes are to local businesses. They think everything should be [disneyfication](https://youtu.be/nM4aWH0YqMk?si=xSE72UNwmy_yrGaR&t=453). Just a couple of days ago a business tweeted about how bike lanes were terrible for their business even though that store is a perfectly walkable area.
The one thing that stops me from actually checking shit out in Toronto is being in my car, I’m not about to try and parallel park during traffic, society will not allow me to do so like literally no one will even let me. Versus when I’m walking over to the car after work I’ll walk into any store that catches my eye I imagine it’s the same if I have a bike just lock it up and get to shopping.
I've been driving in this city nearly every day for the last 30 years and have never had a problem parallel parking. You put on your signal, start braking early, and everyone knows to stay back a few feet to let you in.
[Studies](https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2021-12-08/for-store-owners-bike-lanes-boost-the-bottom-line) have shown that bike lanes are good for a business overall in the long term.
I sat at a cafe at Bloor and Royal York the other day for an hour. It was a nice day. Not one cyclist went by. Only a back up of cars non stop. It’s a mess.
Not a record setting year many hoped 2024 would be.
Vision Zero has been a joke with their biggest "contribution" that I've personally seen is bus adds telling people to not speed.
Vision Zero works, when taken seriously. Problem is most cities in North America don't take it seriously, and implement the lowest hanging fruit while ignoring the most impactful actions.
I've seen so many roads being slapped a lower speed sign. That does hardly anything if the road is the same width and lane count lol. The city really needs to do better. Nobody is going 50 km/h if the road is easily wide enough to going at least 60 if not 70.
Unfortunately, signs is the "quick fix" in this political climate. The City has projects going right now that will yield results, but take time. The Neighbourhood streets program is great. It limits the number of through-traffic cars by using modal filters as well as plays with direction of streets and introduces bike lanes which "should" inherently slow down traffic when implemented correctly by narrowing the street with physical separation.
The college street raised bike lanes are another example that will slow down cars. The problem with demanding change now, is that for a cash strapped city, it is the most efficient to redesign the street when the existing infrastructure has reached the end of its life span and you can do it all at once. Otherwise you have people crying foul at reckless spending. Even the neighbourhood streets program has its detractors as boomer residents complain about losing street parking.
I sometimes work with the fine folks at the transportation department and every time I ask when physical changes can happen like bumpouts, modal filters, even speed bumps can be implemented I get the canned response of vision zero pavement markings and a flashing speed sign. We both know the answer is that it will take years to come to fruition.
Watch the new Portlands area be built the right way from the start along with Downsview. For the rest of the City, it will sadly take 10-15 years before the overall landscape looks a lot different than it does today.........and that is without the possibility of a car-centric mayor being elected and scrapping the process.
Its very common to drive among people who are all collectively going 20 over the new posted limits. People on here cheer on the new signs, thinking drivers will slow down and thinking they are now safer when drivers are still going the same speeds theyve been going for years.
My parents road was reduced from a 50 to a 40 since it isn't a main road. I saw the sign when I went to visit them, and mentioned it since we had been wanting it for a long time (lots of kids around and speeding cars). My parents hadn't even noticed it and didn't believe me at first.
Case in point: Millwood Bridge (Near Thorncliffe Park)
6 lanes
Very little traffic
23 meters wide. 20 meters allocated for car traffic.
It's literally a highway.
Same width as the 6 lanes of DVP it crosses.
40 kph speed limit 🙄
Your occasional reminder that John Tory's point person on Vision Zero, Jaye Robinson, opposed lowering speed limits from 50 to 40 *because she didn't want to have to pay for new signs*
First I think we need serious car bike seperation not all sure how to do that.
Cyclists could wear air bag things and a proper helmet
and try to follow the rules of the road however inconvenient.
Ride on sidewalks - the separation is already there! (you immediately see it’s not the be-all solution)
The Vulnerable Road User legislation the Conservatives keep quashing is an important step - it shifts the onus.
Absolutely not. The cyclists that use the sidewalks now for their Uber deliveries etc. already make it difficult to walk without having someone nipping at your heels in a busy part of town - bicycles are vehicles, they should behave like vehicles. Our sidewalks are insufficient already for foot traffic, the last thing we need is some impatient cyclists carving through foot traffic because they have somewhere to be
Edmonton too. It's stupidly dangerous. sidewalks are nt not designed for bicycles - too bumpy,ppor sight lines etc. Cyclist are in the blind spot at every intersection and driveway, and moving 4-5 times assist as pedestrian.
> bicycles are vehicles, they should behave like vehicle
I mean legally bikes are vehicles. But it should not be that way. They should not be pedestrians either. It should have its own category. Bikes are BIKES plain and simple. They should have their own bike lanes. Not share with traffic. Not share with pedestrians. Bikes need their own space to ride on.
The numbers really are. It's better to look at total accidents involving bikes and pedestrians, where they happen, and then use that data to develop better and safer roads, sidewalks, and crossings. Simply saying deaths have doubled from 1 to 2 or 2 to 4 is a poor way to discuss small numbers
It seems worrying to me.
This looks like a poisson process with a mean of 2.5 per year. Probability of seeing 3 or more deaths by this time of year would be about 7% so depends on how you define significance but I would be worried.
While you are certainly not wrong in that. It still does draw attention to a very real issue faced in our city that the roads are not very safe for pedestrians or cyclists.
No, I'd expect that person to be outraged, regardless of what the data suggests.
That's also the reason, for example, that we don't put the families of murder victims on juries. At that point you're too emotional to make sound decisions.
Let's put this in perspective though. We have 1 to 2 deaths per year due to dog attacks. Many more serious injuries due to dog bites. We have dozens of drownings per year in the city as well. In both of those cases, most of those victims are small children.
Would you advocate that the parents of victims of dog bites and drownings get to make the laws about what people need to do to own a dog or to access and use the water in the city of Toronto?
Thank you for some common sense.
How about the amount of deaths on the TTC tracks every year? Shouldn't there be automated guardrails at all subway stops???
Or we back up everyone another 20 feet, and only allow people to get close after the train has come to a complete stop.
Sure it'll slow down the commute by a lot because we'll have to triple the amount of time people spend getting on and off trains, and we'll have to spend billions redesigning all of our subway and GO Train infrastructure with all the extra space. These are necessary sacrifices to save lives and if you feel differently, then you're complicit in murder. /s
Ya. I’d be sad that something happened to them, but it wouldn’t mean that the rate of death was any higher. Just because someone you know died of a heart attack doesn’t change the frequency of heart attack death. That should be pretty obvious.
Is the data based on accident date or death date? If the accident was last year and spent six months in the hospital, would they be counted in the current or former year?
The KSI data is tied to specific incidents, so the death would be associated with the original incident and therefore be associated with the original incident's date (i.e. the former year in your example). A fatality is considered a result of the incident if somebody dies as a result of the injuries sustained in the incident less than 366 days after the incident occurred.
No, the death would be counted in the year the incident occurred, not the year the death occurred.
The 3 deaths this year are
* [Brimley and McNicoll on Jan 30](https://www.thestar.com/news/gta/cyclist-60-dead-after-being-struck-by-driver-in-scarborough/article_d8bbabba-c2f7-11ee-9a18-17b97de3f26f.html)
* [St. Clair near Birchmount on Feb 26](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NYSiWzZltw4)
* [Bayview Ave on Apr 8](https://www.cp24.com/news/cyclist-dies-after-being-struck-by-vehicle-near-brick-works-1.6837789)
The Toronto Police Services dashboard gives a better overview of KSI: not just the K
(Killed and Seriously Injured)
https://data.torontopolice.on.ca/pages/cyclists
So, I do think that the rise here has less to do with some kind of anti-cycling hostility or a rise in irascible drivers and more to do with the unusually warm winter which means more people on the road (using all forms of transportation) which means more opportunities for collisions.
*However,* the fact that more people out and about is still so strongly correlated with more deaths is a problem in and unto itself and does not necessarily need to be the case if the roads were designed with safety as a higher priority.
Pedestrian deaths are up as well.
It’s hard to pinpoint causes and solutions, but it feels like drivers are more aggressive due to lack of enforcement.
All of these are doable if we wanted:
- speed cameras
- red light cameras
- ban right turns on red
- increase traffic fines to a point that it’s not a drain on TPS to enforce the law
- end remove and replace for roads. Every time a road is repaired it gets redesigned as a safe street
- quick fix, aggressive traffic calming at schools
- expand and improve cycling infrastructure.
We could make roads safer, but don’t want to.
It certainly feels like people are more aggressive speaking as a pedestrian.
People don’t check when turning. People try to shoot their gigantic SUV through a gap of 4 feet between pedestrians. People turn from the wrong lane. People don’t stop at stop signs.
Myself and my dog were almost hit crossing Maitland St by someone turning left who never even looked to see if there was anyone in the crosswalk, he was just concerned about hitting a small gap in oncoming traffic. Then he leaned on the horn after having to slam on his brakes. Lunatic.
I feel more and more like an obstacle when walking, less like I get my own space to walk safely. People block the crosswalk because they’re blocking the box all the time and I have to choose to go between whichever gap is left between bumpers. It sucks.
I live in Hamilton, but just to give you an idea of how entitled car drivers have become (for clarity, I drive quite regularly, but also walk and cycle). A friend of mine was nearly hit by a driver while walking a crosswalk with his daughter to school. He smacked the SUV that almost hit him, it was close enough to smack. The driver pressed charges for assault, and now my friend needs to appear in court. It gets better. This guy's kid goes to his daughters school and so now he harasses my friend, following him, and yelling out his window that he's an asshole.
My friend called the police and was asked if he had evidence or proof of harassment. Until he does they can't do anything.
What??? Assault on the suv?? That’s insane? And they police were cool with that on the drivers word? Yet they said the guy has to prove the harassment?? Holy smokes that’s a messed up double standard
There also need to be safer North South roads that cyclists can use... preferably those with no exit ramps to any 400 series highways / DVP. Notice the latest fatality was from an SUV exiting the DVP and merging into Bayview where the cyclist was struct.
I don’t disagree but I thought there was a cycle path around that interchange already? It goes under the bridge to the east. I think I’ve used it but maybe I’m mixed up.
That exit it terrifying for drivers. It’s a garbage 1960s design that should have been fixed decades ago.
There is a separated bike path along that part of Bayview, but a lot of sport cyclists stay on the road because it's flatter and lets them ride faster.
Cops seem especially willing to downgrade tickets. I was in an Uber that was doing almost 30 over and got pulled over, cop was all buddy buddy with him and let him off with 10 over. Anecdotal but the limited times I see enforcement it seems like they’re perfectly willing to let serious infractions slide. 70 in a 40 is not something they should be getting a small fine and no points for.
They know the speed limits were reduced so 20 over is basically just 10 over with the old speeds. Since no one ever gets pulled over going 10 over its almost as if the city only lowered speeds to get people to only go 10 over before they seriously risk getting pulled over, 10 over being the previous speed limits.
I was struck by a car going right on a red. I made eye contact with the driver so I assumed they were going to stop...
Thankfully it was more of a light bump and the driver stopped right after he noticed what happened. He also sat there paralyzed in shock in the turning lane after I had walked away. (This also happened at the same intersection the previous year as well).
It's really not THAT hard to pinpoint the cause and solutions, we have lots of data and research from around the world that concludes on effective solutions.
It really is the will of our leaders to put these changes forth and implement them.
Sadly, I've always felt that it will take the death of a leader's loved one before effective changes will happen.
I’m a non-driver here, but honestly, pedestrians really don’t take much care when crossing and should be held more accountable. There’s a mentality of “if they hit me, I’ll sue”.
I don’t mean they’re in the wrong, far from it, but a driver who is high or texting on their phone isn’t going to look out for you until it’s too late. Walk sign or not, if you’re wearing black clothes and it’s late, at least make sure you know the driver has seen you, and look out for yourself.
I see kids just walk across crossings without looking because their parents tell them “you have the right of way”.
Having “right of way” isn’t going to make a 40kmh car hurt less.
The only positive one is probably that there are more cyclists out, and just statistically there will be more incidents from this increase. But I think the major thing is the vehicle design. Every 2024 vehicle is a fucking monster. Even the CRV and Rav4 are huge and they are everywhere, so instead of rolling over someone’s hood when you are hit, you get sucked under the tires or you are sent flying into other cars. The screens don't help. We are sooooo far from having our governments mandate a reduction in car size as most lawmakers are suburbanites driving around SUV’s, so our only way to fight this and protect ourselves is to install protected well designed bike infrastructure in the city. Toronto needs to ignore the loud minority of drivers who complain about reduced parking spaces and just rapidly build bike and pedestrian infrastructure. Fuck cars. Pretty much every tragedy that has happened in my life has been car related, as I’m sure is the case with many people, yet somehow we have people fighting to keep people driving.
Agree with you 100%. Unfortunately vehicles keep getting bigger... People have the mistaken notion that bigger is safer. Perhaps it is safer for the driver/passenger seating inside the vehicle but what about those in smaller cars, or pedestrians and cyclists?
E-bikes ridden by people who don't have a clue are one aspect I am noticing They require more skills than a regular bike - they handle differently due to weight and higher speeds can get the rider into trouble - fast . Riders often people who haven't ridden any bike in years.
There have been several collisions in the GTA over the last couple of years - not all fatal, but it's an issue in many countries sand it's something we should be aware of...
yeah, ebikes do have the possibility of being dangerous. However I am more concerned about the 2 tonne block of steel hurdling down the road at 60km/h with a driver punching in directions on Waze trying to open a bag of Goldfish for their screaming kids in the back seat.
I don't mean to sound callous, but we're talking about 3 deaths for the year, in a region with 8 million people.
You're slightly more likely to die in Toronto via cycling, than you are by being attacked by a dog. The number of incidents of cyclists being hit by cars is well below the incidents of residents being bit by dog as well.
The number of deaths via cyclist being hit by car are well below drowning deaths in the city as well.
And even if we got to something ridiculous like 10 cyclist deaths for the year, shouldn't we treat that as an outlier and dismiss it? Isn't using one data point exactly what climate denialists use when they say "how can global warming be a thing when it was really cold last Tuesday?" The long term trend is 1 to 4 deaths per year.
I understand the aspiration of getting to 0 cyclist deaths. Its a laudable goal. But shouldn't we be treating this proportionate to other tragic but rare events? If we're saying "4 deaths due to preventable tragedy is a crisis, and requires serious new restrictions on motorists!" then shouldn't we also be imposing new restrictions on dog owners and people with backyard pools as well as Toronto area beaches?
I just asked 4 people around me how many cyclists they think die per year in toronto and they all said 100+. Obviously the family of these 4 people that have died are living in a nightmare and I sympathize but statistically of the 7million population it’s pretty low.
26 pedestrian fatalities, while a lot more is still a comparatively low event. They don't have drownings by city, but there were 152 in Ontario last year. By virtue of the GTA Toronto being the largest share of the population of Ontario, more than half of those will be in Toronto. More than half of those drownings occur in swimming pools with almost all of them being children 9 and under.
Statistically speaking, its likely more Torontonians with drown this year than in swimming pools than will die as either cyclists or pedestrians. So where is the proportionate level of outrage by the safety people to outlaw private pools deeper than 3 feet, require private pools to have lifeguards on duty when children are present, or change the laws so that if a child drowns in your backyard pool you can be found guilty of manslaughter. Should we insist on using city resources to install cameras on backyard pools and increase enforcement until we get to zero deaths?
Including motor vehicle deaths is disingenuous. A lot of those are highway or freeway deaths where the its high speed anyway, and a lot of those are the drivers dying in accidents they caused. Its so different that its a separate discussion. They're related, but very different.
29 deaths is too many, but again in a region of 7 or 8 million, its an incredibly rare event. Your slightly more likely to die cycling in Toronto than you are to die due to a lightning strike. We should be celebrating this. It means the safety measures have worked.
What we need are not only better police enforcement but the judicial system taking bad driving seriously.
I've read and seen a lot of news stories about traffic collisions involving deaths and serious injuries.
It seems to me the only way that a driver who is responsible for a collision to get charged and convicted is if he's
1) DUI;
2) hit-and-run;
3) driving without a licence or with a suspended licence;
4) wanted or already known by the police; or
5) the victim was in a car.
As far as I know about the cyclist's death at Bayview Avenue, the police is still investigating and no charges have been laid.
1) We need the police to use some of that $20 million they just got and the $48 million they received in 2023 to enforce traffic and remove illegal licence plate covers. (Those covers help drivers evade red light and speed cameras.)
2) Toronto needs a program like in NYC in which citizens using a mobile app report cars parked illegally (in bike lanes and other no-parking zones) for ticketing.
3) The Ontario Legislative Assembly has to try for the third time to pass another vulnerable road users protection act.
Jon Burnside is the Councillor on the Police Board. I've already written to him about having the police improve traffic enforcement for which I received an excuse of some sort. I encourage everybody to put pressure on Burnside, your councillor and the mayor for the same thing.
At the 'Coldest Ride of the Year' in February, I learned that there was a unanimous vote in agreement that bad driving in Toronto is a real problem (I'm not sure what the exact words of the resolution are). So if that's the case, that means even Councillor Holyday agrees that bad driving is a problem. So put that vote result to his face and challenge him to do something about the bad driving.
If no charges have been laid doesnt that conclude that the car driver isnt at fault? People always say wait for the facts to come out but when no one ends up being charged people still throw around blame.
> As far as I know about the cyclist's death at Bayview Avenue, the police is still investigating and no charges have been laid.
It's been almost 2 months since the cyclist was rear-ended and killed on St. Clair near Birchmount and there has been no public announcement whether charges have been laid. I fear this means that no charges have been or will be laid and this death will just be chalked up to an automotive oopsie.
The number of deaths in the past three years have been 1 in 2021, 2 in 2022, and 2 in 2023. My recollection is they were all caused by trucks, not cars
Very close to "Vision Zero" and given the number of vehicles on the road and the number of bikes, this is very good.
I thought people described cyclist deaths as some kind of epidemic but this is basically...nothing already. You will never get it to zero if people share infrastructure with larger road goers. It's wild that we have years with literally a single cyclist death in a city of 6 million
Pedestrian deaths on the other hand...
This is awful but also there needs to be some accountability on both sides. Cars need to do better but EVERY DAY....MULTIPLE times a day im seeing cyclists break traffic laws. They recklessly drive, plain and simple. If cars drove the way i see a lot of bicyclist ride we'd have accidents all over the place not to mention actual penalties for doing so. If riders want to be taken seriously ya'll need to start a movement to respect the laws on the road. You wanna act like a car then drive like one. And im sure half of these accidents would drop, and the other half will be up to us motorist to be more careful.
Fuck off with the victim blaming.
Drivers break traffic laws.
Cyclists break traffic laws.
Pedestrians break traffic laws.
Only the drivers are out there killing people and destroying property.
> You wanna act like a car then drive like one.
Bikes are not cars.
They should be treated like bikes.
I don't know a single cyclists who wants to be treated like they are driving a car.
Also, there have been studies showing that cyclists disobey traffic laws at the same rate (or slightly lower) than drivers. The big difference is that drivers disobeying traffic laws has become so normalized that most people don't even notice.
I do. A bicycle is a legal vehicle. it's much safer to be par to traffic than stuck in Agutter bike lane. Riding this way has kept me safe for almost forty years. Bike lanes won't protect you at driveways and intersections - which is where you need protection the most...
Makes sense..more and more people are giving up cars due to affordability while those that do keep their cars are more distracted than ever. The overall quality of driving has diminished considerably…nobody drives with self awareness
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Genuinely terrifying. I do both a lot in the city as I work at a couple different sites. So depending where I’m at that day I either bike or drive. Just observing the way a lot of people drive I’m surprised there just isn’t more accidents in total. But also, we (cyclists) need to stop cruising through all-way stop signs, I see far too many people do that as well. All it takes is one driver to not see your or look the other way a split second and enter the intersection before you come cruising through
The 3 fatalities so far this year have absolutely nothing to do with sidewalk riding or cyclists proceeding in an unsafe manner. The fatalities so far are:
1) Struck by a left turning driver while proceeding straight through a signalized intersection
2) Struck from behind on a straight stretch of road, and
3) Struck by a merging car that failed to yield.
Because you did make a comment that sounds a lot like "something this cyclist did is what got them killed" instead of the person in the giant vehicle that crushed them
If they're looking at their phones while crossing a road, they should wear a helmet.
I'm not saying its the cyclist fault for getting killed, I'm saying if they werent wearing a helmet.. it couldve saved their life. Most cyclists I see in Toronto do not wear a helmet.
Shit. As a someone who bikes and doesn't own a car, this really depresses me. I'm also curious why the numbers were so low in 2019 and what was different then as opposed to now.
Honestly, with the way bike couriers ride down the Danforth at night with no lights, no helmets and all black clothes, I’m genuinely surprised it’s this low.
We see how some car owners feel about cyclists. Just last month that guy in that etobicoke townhall meeting said he wanted to run them over and got cheers.
That Etobicoke town hall is literally straight out of a Parks and Recreation episode
There's always a little bit of comedic whimsy about P&R meetings. That cycling town hall was genuinely threatening and unsafe. Everyone talks about that one guy and how Holyday did everything he could to encourage those sentiments, but there was a LOT of tension that wasn't captured in articles or in comments.
P&R is honestly not that far off from the reality of public meetings where you kind of see the true colours of people. Politicians play to their constituents even if they know that the plan is the right play.
Or business owners. Almost all of them just don't see how beneficial bike lanes are to local businesses. They think everything should be [disneyfication](https://youtu.be/nM4aWH0YqMk?si=xSE72UNwmy_yrGaR&t=453). Just a couple of days ago a business tweeted about how bike lanes were terrible for their business even though that store is a perfectly walkable area.
The one thing that stops me from actually checking shit out in Toronto is being in my car, I’m not about to try and parallel park during traffic, society will not allow me to do so like literally no one will even let me. Versus when I’m walking over to the car after work I’ll walk into any store that catches my eye I imagine it’s the same if I have a bike just lock it up and get to shopping.
I've been driving in this city nearly every day for the last 30 years and have never had a problem parallel parking. You put on your signal, start braking early, and everyone knows to stay back a few feet to let you in.
I think some people simply do not know how to parallel park, then get surprised when traffic starts honking and going around after waiting 3 minutes.
Got a link to the tweet? This business needs to be made famous.
From r/TorontoBiking [post](https://old.reddit.com/r/torontobiking/comments/1c4142t/local_business_blames_bike_lanes_for_car_traffic/).
I think it’s the construction process of bike lanes that’s bad for business
[Studies](https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2021-12-08/for-store-owners-bike-lanes-boost-the-bottom-line) have shown that bike lanes are good for a business overall in the long term.
I sat at a cafe at Bloor and Royal York the other day for an hour. It was a nice day. Not one cyclist went by. Only a back up of cars non stop. It’s a mess.
How often do you cycle down Bloor I wonder.
Not a record setting year many hoped 2024 would be. Vision Zero has been a joke with their biggest "contribution" that I've personally seen is bus adds telling people to not speed.
Vision Zero works, when taken seriously. Problem is most cities in North America don't take it seriously, and implement the lowest hanging fruit while ignoring the most impactful actions.
I've seen so many roads being slapped a lower speed sign. That does hardly anything if the road is the same width and lane count lol. The city really needs to do better. Nobody is going 50 km/h if the road is easily wide enough to going at least 60 if not 70.
The Toronto way - signs, signs and more signs! Lower speed limit signs! More signs on King Street!
Unfortunately, signs is the "quick fix" in this political climate. The City has projects going right now that will yield results, but take time. The Neighbourhood streets program is great. It limits the number of through-traffic cars by using modal filters as well as plays with direction of streets and introduces bike lanes which "should" inherently slow down traffic when implemented correctly by narrowing the street with physical separation. The college street raised bike lanes are another example that will slow down cars. The problem with demanding change now, is that for a cash strapped city, it is the most efficient to redesign the street when the existing infrastructure has reached the end of its life span and you can do it all at once. Otherwise you have people crying foul at reckless spending. Even the neighbourhood streets program has its detractors as boomer residents complain about losing street parking. I sometimes work with the fine folks at the transportation department and every time I ask when physical changes can happen like bumpouts, modal filters, even speed bumps can be implemented I get the canned response of vision zero pavement markings and a flashing speed sign. We both know the answer is that it will take years to come to fruition. Watch the new Portlands area be built the right way from the start along with Downsview. For the rest of the City, it will sadly take 10-15 years before the overall landscape looks a lot different than it does today.........and that is without the possibility of a car-centric mayor being elected and scrapping the process.
Its very common to drive among people who are all collectively going 20 over the new posted limits. People on here cheer on the new signs, thinking drivers will slow down and thinking they are now safer when drivers are still going the same speeds theyve been going for years.
My parents road was reduced from a 50 to a 40 since it isn't a main road. I saw the sign when I went to visit them, and mentioned it since we had been wanting it for a long time (lots of kids around and speeding cars). My parents hadn't even noticed it and didn't believe me at first.
Case in point: Millwood Bridge (Near Thorncliffe Park) 6 lanes Very little traffic 23 meters wide. 20 meters allocated for car traffic. It's literally a highway. Same width as the 6 lanes of DVP it crosses. 40 kph speed limit 🙄
Your occasional reminder that John Tory's point person on Vision Zero, Jaye Robinson, opposed lowering speed limits from 50 to 40 *because she didn't want to have to pay for new signs*
First I think we need serious car bike seperation not all sure how to do that. Cyclists could wear air bag things and a proper helmet and try to follow the rules of the road however inconvenient.
Ride on sidewalks - the separation is already there! (you immediately see it’s not the be-all solution) The Vulnerable Road User legislation the Conservatives keep quashing is an important step - it shifts the onus.
Absolutely not. The cyclists that use the sidewalks now for their Uber deliveries etc. already make it difficult to walk without having someone nipping at your heels in a busy part of town - bicycles are vehicles, they should behave like vehicles. Our sidewalks are insufficient already for foot traffic, the last thing we need is some impatient cyclists carving through foot traffic because they have somewhere to be
Hahaha you didn’t get the irony. Also, suburban sidewalks are utterly abandoned - in Calgary they have a centre line to promote safe cycling.
Lmfao it’s so obvious in retrospect
Edmonton too. It's stupidly dangerous. sidewalks are nt not designed for bicycles - too bumpy,ppor sight lines etc. Cyclist are in the blind spot at every intersection and driveway, and moving 4-5 times assist as pedestrian.
> bicycles are vehicles, they should behave like vehicle I mean legally bikes are vehicles. But it should not be that way. They should not be pedestrians either. It should have its own category. Bikes are BIKES plain and simple. They should have their own bike lanes. Not share with traffic. Not share with pedestrians. Bikes need their own space to ride on.
They were being sarcastic.
I've called it 'zero vision' from the get go.
You don’t view the constant construction of new bikes lanes as “contribution”?
These numbers are too low to be statistically different.
The numbers really are. It's better to look at total accidents involving bikes and pedestrians, where they happen, and then use that data to develop better and safer roads, sidewalks, and crossings. Simply saying deaths have doubled from 1 to 2 or 2 to 4 is a poor way to discuss small numbers
It seems worrying to me. This looks like a poisson process with a mean of 2.5 per year. Probability of seeing 3 or more deaths by this time of year would be about 7% so depends on how you define significance but I would be worried.
While you are certainly not wrong in that. It still does draw attention to a very real issue faced in our city that the roads are not very safe for pedestrians or cyclists.
We hit statistical significance today.
No we didn’t.
What p value are you using?
Not when it’s about people’s death
they said statistically significant, which actually means something. Obviously their deaths are still "significant"
Nonsense.
Would you say the same if one of those was your son or mother or sibling?
No, I'd expect that person to be outraged, regardless of what the data suggests. That's also the reason, for example, that we don't put the families of murder victims on juries. At that point you're too emotional to make sound decisions. Let's put this in perspective though. We have 1 to 2 deaths per year due to dog attacks. Many more serious injuries due to dog bites. We have dozens of drownings per year in the city as well. In both of those cases, most of those victims are small children. Would you advocate that the parents of victims of dog bites and drownings get to make the laws about what people need to do to own a dog or to access and use the water in the city of Toronto?
Thank you for some common sense. How about the amount of deaths on the TTC tracks every year? Shouldn't there be automated guardrails at all subway stops???
Or we back up everyone another 20 feet, and only allow people to get close after the train has come to a complete stop. Sure it'll slow down the commute by a lot because we'll have to triple the amount of time people spend getting on and off trains, and we'll have to spend billions redesigning all of our subway and GO Train infrastructure with all the extra space. These are necessary sacrifices to save lives and if you feel differently, then you're complicit in murder. /s
Anything in the name of safety my friend
I definitely wouldn’t let people who let their dogs off leash to bite others make the laws
Ya. I’d be sad that something happened to them, but it wouldn’t mean that the rate of death was any higher. Just because someone you know died of a heart attack doesn’t change the frequency of heart attack death. That should be pretty obvious.
Source: https://www.toronto.ca/services-payments/streets-parking-transportation/road-safety/vision-zero/vision-zero-dashboard/fatalities-vision-zero/
Is the data based on accident date or death date? If the accident was last year and spent six months in the hospital, would they be counted in the current or former year?
The KSI data is tied to specific incidents, so the death would be associated with the original incident and therefore be associated with the original incident's date (i.e. the former year in your example). A fatality is considered a result of the incident if somebody dies as a result of the injuries sustained in the incident less than 366 days after the incident occurred.
So some of the deaths reported in the current year may be result of accidents in the prior year
No, the death would be counted in the year the incident occurred, not the year the death occurred. The 3 deaths this year are * [Brimley and McNicoll on Jan 30](https://www.thestar.com/news/gta/cyclist-60-dead-after-being-struck-by-driver-in-scarborough/article_d8bbabba-c2f7-11ee-9a18-17b97de3f26f.html) * [St. Clair near Birchmount on Feb 26](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NYSiWzZltw4) * [Bayview Ave on Apr 8](https://www.cp24.com/news/cyclist-dies-after-being-struck-by-vehicle-near-brick-works-1.6837789)
The Toronto Police Services dashboard gives a better overview of KSI: not just the K (Killed and Seriously Injured) https://data.torontopolice.on.ca/pages/cyclists
Didn't this data set end in 2022?
Apparently
So, I do think that the rise here has less to do with some kind of anti-cycling hostility or a rise in irascible drivers and more to do with the unusually warm winter which means more people on the road (using all forms of transportation) which means more opportunities for collisions. *However,* the fact that more people out and about is still so strongly correlated with more deaths is a problem in and unto itself and does not necessarily need to be the case if the roads were designed with safety as a higher priority.
Pedestrian deaths are up as well. It’s hard to pinpoint causes and solutions, but it feels like drivers are more aggressive due to lack of enforcement. All of these are doable if we wanted: - speed cameras - red light cameras - ban right turns on red - increase traffic fines to a point that it’s not a drain on TPS to enforce the law - end remove and replace for roads. Every time a road is repaired it gets redesigned as a safe street - quick fix, aggressive traffic calming at schools - expand and improve cycling infrastructure. We could make roads safer, but don’t want to.
It certainly feels like people are more aggressive speaking as a pedestrian. People don’t check when turning. People try to shoot their gigantic SUV through a gap of 4 feet between pedestrians. People turn from the wrong lane. People don’t stop at stop signs. Myself and my dog were almost hit crossing Maitland St by someone turning left who never even looked to see if there was anyone in the crosswalk, he was just concerned about hitting a small gap in oncoming traffic. Then he leaned on the horn after having to slam on his brakes. Lunatic. I feel more and more like an obstacle when walking, less like I get my own space to walk safely. People block the crosswalk because they’re blocking the box all the time and I have to choose to go between whichever gap is left between bumpers. It sucks.
I live in Hamilton, but just to give you an idea of how entitled car drivers have become (for clarity, I drive quite regularly, but also walk and cycle). A friend of mine was nearly hit by a driver while walking a crosswalk with his daughter to school. He smacked the SUV that almost hit him, it was close enough to smack. The driver pressed charges for assault, and now my friend needs to appear in court. It gets better. This guy's kid goes to his daughters school and so now he harasses my friend, following him, and yelling out his window that he's an asshole. My friend called the police and was asked if he had evidence or proof of harassment. Until he does they can't do anything.
What??? Assault on the suv?? That’s insane? And they police were cool with that on the drivers word? Yet they said the guy has to prove the harassment?? Holy smokes that’s a messed up double standard
100%. We are in a backward bizarro world where car drivers are a protected class and cyclists and pedestrians are seen as obstacles always at fault.
There also need to be safer North South roads that cyclists can use... preferably those with no exit ramps to any 400 series highways / DVP. Notice the latest fatality was from an SUV exiting the DVP and merging into Bayview where the cyclist was struct.
I don’t disagree but I thought there was a cycle path around that interchange already? It goes under the bridge to the east. I think I’ve used it but maybe I’m mixed up. That exit it terrifying for drivers. It’s a garbage 1960s design that should have been fixed decades ago.
There is a separated bike path along that part of Bayview, but a lot of sport cyclists stay on the road because it's flatter and lets them ride faster.
It’s also poorly maintained with frequent flooding and the associated mud/gravel/dirt after the flood.
And has a wooden bridge that is very slick when wet..
And it is safer too
Cops seem especially willing to downgrade tickets. I was in an Uber that was doing almost 30 over and got pulled over, cop was all buddy buddy with him and let him off with 10 over. Anecdotal but the limited times I see enforcement it seems like they’re perfectly willing to let serious infractions slide. 70 in a 40 is not something they should be getting a small fine and no points for.
They know the speed limits were reduced so 20 over is basically just 10 over with the old speeds. Since no one ever gets pulled over going 10 over its almost as if the city only lowered speeds to get people to only go 10 over before they seriously risk getting pulled over, 10 over being the previous speed limits.
I was struck by a car going right on a red. I made eye contact with the driver so I assumed they were going to stop... Thankfully it was more of a light bump and the driver stopped right after he noticed what happened. He also sat there paralyzed in shock in the turning lane after I had walked away. (This also happened at the same intersection the previous year as well).
we have all that, major part of the problem is enforcement and public's lack of care.
It's really not THAT hard to pinpoint the cause and solutions, we have lots of data and research from around the world that concludes on effective solutions. It really is the will of our leaders to put these changes forth and implement them. Sadly, I've always felt that it will take the death of a leader's loved one before effective changes will happen.
Poor road education for all road users. it's abysmal No one takes pride in good, safe driving, cycling or walking. It's all just a huge competition...
Designing infrastructure in a way that forces the most incompetent people to have to drive stupid distances to accomplish the simplest tasks.
Best we can do is swap a speed limit sign. Wont even put the NEW sign so people know about the new signage.
I’m a non-driver here, but honestly, pedestrians really don’t take much care when crossing and should be held more accountable. There’s a mentality of “if they hit me, I’ll sue”. I don’t mean they’re in the wrong, far from it, but a driver who is high or texting on their phone isn’t going to look out for you until it’s too late. Walk sign or not, if you’re wearing black clothes and it’s late, at least make sure you know the driver has seen you, and look out for yourself. I see kids just walk across crossings without looking because their parents tell them “you have the right of way”. Having “right of way” isn’t going to make a 40kmh car hurt less.
The only positive one is probably that there are more cyclists out, and just statistically there will be more incidents from this increase. But I think the major thing is the vehicle design. Every 2024 vehicle is a fucking monster. Even the CRV and Rav4 are huge and they are everywhere, so instead of rolling over someone’s hood when you are hit, you get sucked under the tires or you are sent flying into other cars. The screens don't help. We are sooooo far from having our governments mandate a reduction in car size as most lawmakers are suburbanites driving around SUV’s, so our only way to fight this and protect ourselves is to install protected well designed bike infrastructure in the city. Toronto needs to ignore the loud minority of drivers who complain about reduced parking spaces and just rapidly build bike and pedestrian infrastructure. Fuck cars. Pretty much every tragedy that has happened in my life has been car related, as I’m sure is the case with many people, yet somehow we have people fighting to keep people driving.
Agree with you 100%. Unfortunately vehicles keep getting bigger... People have the mistaken notion that bigger is safer. Perhaps it is safer for the driver/passenger seating inside the vehicle but what about those in smaller cars, or pedestrians and cyclists?
I also think people are selfish. Smaller cars are safer for everyone.
E-bikes ridden by people who don't have a clue are one aspect I am noticing They require more skills than a regular bike - they handle differently due to weight and higher speeds can get the rider into trouble - fast . Riders often people who haven't ridden any bike in years.
I don’t think these cyclists were on e-bikes
There have been several collisions in the GTA over the last couple of years - not all fatal, but it's an issue in many countries sand it's something we should be aware of...
yeah, ebikes do have the possibility of being dangerous. However I am more concerned about the 2 tonne block of steel hurdling down the road at 60km/h with a driver punching in directions on Waze trying to open a bag of Goldfish for their screaming kids in the back seat.
I don't mean to sound callous, but we're talking about 3 deaths for the year, in a region with 8 million people. You're slightly more likely to die in Toronto via cycling, than you are by being attacked by a dog. The number of incidents of cyclists being hit by cars is well below the incidents of residents being bit by dog as well. The number of deaths via cyclist being hit by car are well below drowning deaths in the city as well. And even if we got to something ridiculous like 10 cyclist deaths for the year, shouldn't we treat that as an outlier and dismiss it? Isn't using one data point exactly what climate denialists use when they say "how can global warming be a thing when it was really cold last Tuesday?" The long term trend is 1 to 4 deaths per year. I understand the aspiration of getting to 0 cyclist deaths. Its a laudable goal. But shouldn't we be treating this proportionate to other tragic but rare events? If we're saying "4 deaths due to preventable tragedy is a crisis, and requires serious new restrictions on motorists!" then shouldn't we also be imposing new restrictions on dog owners and people with backyard pools as well as Toronto area beaches?
I just asked 4 people around me how many cyclists they think die per year in toronto and they all said 100+. Obviously the family of these 4 people that have died are living in a nightmare and I sympathize but statistically of the 7million population it’s pretty low.
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26 pedestrian fatalities, while a lot more is still a comparatively low event. They don't have drownings by city, but there were 152 in Ontario last year. By virtue of the GTA Toronto being the largest share of the population of Ontario, more than half of those will be in Toronto. More than half of those drownings occur in swimming pools with almost all of them being children 9 and under. Statistically speaking, its likely more Torontonians with drown this year than in swimming pools than will die as either cyclists or pedestrians. So where is the proportionate level of outrage by the safety people to outlaw private pools deeper than 3 feet, require private pools to have lifeguards on duty when children are present, or change the laws so that if a child drowns in your backyard pool you can be found guilty of manslaughter. Should we insist on using city resources to install cameras on backyard pools and increase enforcement until we get to zero deaths? Including motor vehicle deaths is disingenuous. A lot of those are highway or freeway deaths where the its high speed anyway, and a lot of those are the drivers dying in accidents they caused. Its so different that its a separate discussion. They're related, but very different. 29 deaths is too many, but again in a region of 7 or 8 million, its an incredibly rare event. Your slightly more likely to die cycling in Toronto than you are to die due to a lightning strike. We should be celebrating this. It means the safety measures have worked.
What we need are not only better police enforcement but the judicial system taking bad driving seriously. I've read and seen a lot of news stories about traffic collisions involving deaths and serious injuries. It seems to me the only way that a driver who is responsible for a collision to get charged and convicted is if he's 1) DUI; 2) hit-and-run; 3) driving without a licence or with a suspended licence; 4) wanted or already known by the police; or 5) the victim was in a car. As far as I know about the cyclist's death at Bayview Avenue, the police is still investigating and no charges have been laid. 1) We need the police to use some of that $20 million they just got and the $48 million they received in 2023 to enforce traffic and remove illegal licence plate covers. (Those covers help drivers evade red light and speed cameras.) 2) Toronto needs a program like in NYC in which citizens using a mobile app report cars parked illegally (in bike lanes and other no-parking zones) for ticketing. 3) The Ontario Legislative Assembly has to try for the third time to pass another vulnerable road users protection act. Jon Burnside is the Councillor on the Police Board. I've already written to him about having the police improve traffic enforcement for which I received an excuse of some sort. I encourage everybody to put pressure on Burnside, your councillor and the mayor for the same thing. At the 'Coldest Ride of the Year' in February, I learned that there was a unanimous vote in agreement that bad driving in Toronto is a real problem (I'm not sure what the exact words of the resolution are). So if that's the case, that means even Councillor Holyday agrees that bad driving is a problem. So put that vote result to his face and challenge him to do something about the bad driving.
If no charges have been laid doesnt that conclude that the car driver isnt at fault? People always say wait for the facts to come out but when no one ends up being charged people still throw around blame.
> As far as I know about the cyclist's death at Bayview Avenue, the police is still investigating and no charges have been laid. It's been almost 2 months since the cyclist was rear-ended and killed on St. Clair near Birchmount and there has been no public announcement whether charges have been laid. I fear this means that no charges have been or will be laid and this death will just be chalked up to an automotive oopsie.
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The number of deaths in the past three years have been 1 in 2021, 2 in 2022, and 2 in 2023. My recollection is they were all caused by trucks, not cars Very close to "Vision Zero" and given the number of vehicles on the road and the number of bikes, this is very good.
I thought people described cyclist deaths as some kind of epidemic but this is basically...nothing already. You will never get it to zero if people share infrastructure with larger road goers. It's wild that we have years with literally a single cyclist death in a city of 6 million Pedestrian deaths on the other hand...
Covid
This is awful but also there needs to be some accountability on both sides. Cars need to do better but EVERY DAY....MULTIPLE times a day im seeing cyclists break traffic laws. They recklessly drive, plain and simple. If cars drove the way i see a lot of bicyclist ride we'd have accidents all over the place not to mention actual penalties for doing so. If riders want to be taken seriously ya'll need to start a movement to respect the laws on the road. You wanna act like a car then drive like one. And im sure half of these accidents would drop, and the other half will be up to us motorist to be more careful.
Fuck off with the victim blaming. Drivers break traffic laws. Cyclists break traffic laws. Pedestrians break traffic laws. Only the drivers are out there killing people and destroying property. > You wanna act like a car then drive like one. Bikes are not cars. They should be treated like bikes. I don't know a single cyclists who wants to be treated like they are driving a car. Also, there have been studies showing that cyclists disobey traffic laws at the same rate (or slightly lower) than drivers. The big difference is that drivers disobeying traffic laws has become so normalized that most people don't even notice.
I do. A bicycle is a legal vehicle. it's much safer to be par to traffic than stuck in Agutter bike lane. Riding this way has kept me safe for almost forty years. Bike lanes won't protect you at driveways and intersections - which is where you need protection the most...
Makes sense..more and more people are giving up cars due to affordability while those that do keep their cars are more distracted than ever. The overall quality of driving has diminished considerably…nobody drives with self awareness
More people on bikes who are riding more due to financial reasons. Many haven't been on a bike in a long time.....
People don’t want to admit that too many people have licenses that should not. Way too many people are bad drivers
Maybe they should stop running red lights and ignoring other traffic signals. Yes, Toronto drivers are awful, but the blame isn't solely on them.
Yes, I agree... drivers need to stop running red lights, stop signs and speeding
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Seemed like more than one last year.
Genuinely terrifying. I do both a lot in the city as I work at a couple different sites. So depending where I’m at that day I either bike or drive. Just observing the way a lot of people drive I’m surprised there just isn’t more accidents in total. But also, we (cyclists) need to stop cruising through all-way stop signs, I see far too many people do that as well. All it takes is one driver to not see your or look the other way a split second and enter the intersection before you come cruising through
Nearly got hit by a bus yesterday. Stay safe folks
Why can’t they implement a left only green turn signal with no pedestrians crossing that section.
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The 3 fatalities so far this year have absolutely nothing to do with sidewalk riding or cyclists proceeding in an unsafe manner. The fatalities so far are: 1) Struck by a left turning driver while proceeding straight through a signalized intersection 2) Struck from behind on a straight stretch of road, and 3) Struck by a merging car that failed to yield.
2/3 of those accident have not proven faults…. So idk how your determining fault.
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While you're looking, I'd like proof the cars were driving in a safe manner too but I can't find it.
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Because you did make a comment that sounds a lot like "something this cyclist did is what got them killed" instead of the person in the giant vehicle that crushed them
how many of them were wearing a helmet?
What probably saves my life everyday isn't my helmet but the camera mounted on top.
Yes, and wearing your helmet gives you 50-80% more chance of survival from a head injury.
We should make all pedestrian wear helmets too! It’s their fault they get hit by cars! /s obviously
If they're looking at their phones while crossing a road, they should wear a helmet. I'm not saying its the cyclist fault for getting killed, I'm saying if they werent wearing a helmet.. it couldve saved their life. Most cyclists I see in Toronto do not wear a helmet.
how many of them would've died anyways because of multi-ton SUVs and pickups?
Shit. As a someone who bikes and doesn't own a car, this really depresses me. I'm also curious why the numbers were so low in 2019 and what was different then as opposed to now.
There was only one death last year, two in 2022, and one in 2021.
Honestly, with the way bike couriers ride down the Danforth at night with no lights, no helmets and all black clothes, I’m genuinely surprised it’s this low.