All Photos by James D. Schwartz / The Urban Country
Following in the footsteps of the great cities in Europe, Toronto alas has created two (permanent) pedestrian-only streets by closing them off from automobile traffic. This is a significant win for the citizens of Toronto who have been fighting for decades for pedestrian-only streets.
The new pedestrian-only areas reside at Gould/Victoria streets at Ryerson University, and Willcocks street between St. George and Huron at the University of Toronto campus.
Early Saturday morning, workers were setting up the tables and chairs at the new Ryerson University pedestrian-street. With the school year starting imminently, this public space will be bustling in no time.
The downward trend of accommodating the automobile at all costs began in 1955 when construction on the Frederick G. Gardiner Expressway first began. The Gardiner Expressway divided neighbourhoods from the lake, tore down hundreds of homes, destroyed park space, an amusement park and even threatened to destroy Toronto’s historic Fort York.
Toronto continued to cater to automobiles in the years - and decades – after the completion of the Gardiner. Luckily a group of protesters led by Jane Jacobs helped prevent the north-south Spadina Expressway from being completed. It’s abominable to imagine how many wonderful neighbourhoods would have been destroyed by the expressway along Spadina Ave.
Despite Toronto’s victory in preventing the Spadina Expressway from being built in 1971, many people still believe that Toronto needs to build more highways to accommodate the growing suburbs.
But I struggle to comprehend the logic in envisioning Toronto to be more like an American city – with vast networks of highways across the city, but a lack of neighbourhoods within the city. Building more highways begets more traffic.
Toronto’s population has steadily grown over the last 30 years (Metro CMA population is more than 5 million people), while the number of highways has virtually stayed the same. When roads approach their capacity, people find other ways to get to the city (public transit, bikes, commuter trains, etc). Similarly, when new roads are built in a large city, they quickly fill up to capacity – as evidenced in big cities like Los Angeles, Beijing, or New York.
2010 marks a new decade and a new era for Toronto - and other cities in North America. The new trend is to start giving space back to citizens by building Complete Streets and pedestrian-only zones to enhance the urban realm and improve the experience for citizens and visitors alike.
New York drastically improved its Times Square by simply blocking traffic from entering a section of Broadway Ave and throwing up a few tables and chairs. Similarly, one of Montreal’s most thriving streets is the pedestrian-only Prince Arthur street.
Though these pedestrian streets may seem foreign to many North American cities, they are par for the course in European cities. But we have a decades-old addiction to the automobile, and the first step to curing an addiction is to first acknowledge that we have an addiction. Once acknowledged, we can begin to cure it.
The Ryerson pedestrian-only space might be 20 years overdue, but it is certainly a step in the right direction.
Stay tuned for a follow-up article after the school-year commences and the pedestrian street thrives.
James D. Schwartz is the editor of The Urban Country. You can contact James at james.schwartz@theurbancountry.com.
Related Articles:
- Flowers on a One-Way Street (Feb 2010)
- Car Culture Bleeds Our Society (Aug 2010)
- Ignoring the Real Problem On Our Streets (Nov 2009)
- Biking the Big Apple (Mar 2010)
Taking Our City Back
Monday, August 30, 2010
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Photo of convert Kerri McKenna – 2010
2010 has been an interesting year. I have had countless friends and acquaintances come up to me and ask me for advice on where to get a bike, or how to find the best route to work. The number of cycling “newcomers” has been astounding, and it gives me hope for the future of cities in North America.
The latest cycling newcomer is Kerri McKenna. On July 21st, Kerri sent out an email to get some advice on where to buy a bicycle and how much to spend. Kerri was fed up with her 1 hour commute via public transit, and she knew it would take less time riding a bike.
What Kerri did not perhaps realize is all the other little benefits of riding her bike – like enjoying the view of the lake for example.
We interviewed Kerri to find out how her world has changed since she started using the bicycle for transportation:
How did you commute to work previously? How long did it take you?
[KM] I was a devotee of the TTC (public transit) – and didn’t mind it at all. But I recently changed jobs to a location about ½ a kilometre from the Entertainment District (where I used to work) and my 45 minute commute changed to 60-75 minutes. The extra 15-30 minutes seemed ludicrous and is what caused me to start thinking about riding.
How long does your new commute take you by bike?
[KM] I am thrilled to say that I have cut my commute time down to 40 minutes + 10 minutes to change clothes at work. Although I would consider this still close to an hour, I can at least say that exercise is part of my daily routine.
What triggered the decision to start riding your bike to work?
[KM] It was the commuting time added on by moving to a new office location. Even though driving cut my time down substantially, I knew that illogical traffic jams and construction could still be counted on to make my commute vary from day to day.
How comfortable is your bike commute? Have you encountered any bad roads that you try to avoid?
[KM] I ride along the path (Martin Goodman trail) on the eastbound Lake Shore to Front/Bathurst – so it’s great. Before my first official bike to work, I tried the street routes (Annette > West Toronto Bike Rail Path > Dundas > Queen > Bathurst) and felt a bit nervous. But the dedicated paths along the lake make my commute easy and enjoyable.
What is your favourite part of your commute?
[KM] Hands-down, it’s enjoying the views of the lake in the morning and in the evening.
Are you using your bike for other trips besides commuting? (e.g. going out for dinner, going to the store, etc)
[KM] I attached a basket to the back of my bike and I don’t know what I would do without it! I store my clothing and laptop in it to and from work, but also use it to pick up groceries and dry cleaning on the weekends and in the evenings. It’s invaluable.
Where did you pick up your bike? How much did it cost?
[KM] I didn’t want to spend a lot of money at the outset because I didn’t know if I would like cycling or stick with it. My parents kept an old bike my brothers and I used throughout high school, and my dad was only too happy to finally get it out of the garage. We got it tuned up and I purchased a new seat, bell and the basket. My initial outlay was $150-200 – which was in the range that I wanted to spend. In the Fall I will have to purchase lights, but after that my setup should keep me going for a while.
What advice would you give to someone else who is considering making the switch to a bicycle?
[KM] Just try it – cycling really allows you to experience the city in new ways. The addition of new bike lanes throughout the city really helped persuade me that I could do this and not be nervous about all of the cars. As a driver in the city, I know how crazy they can be! I don’t see too many other people with baskets, but I would encourage people to think about getting one because they enable you to run all kinds of practical errands, rather than just riding to and from places.
Have you become an overnight advocate for better infrastructure? Have you joined the Toronto Cyclists Union yet to advocate on your behalf?
[KM] I don’t think I’m there yet. I noticed the Toronto Cyclists Union just this week – they had a tent set up along the Lakeshore. I had no idea that such a group existed, although I shouldn’t be surprised. There really seems to be a strong community of cyclists in Toronto, and I expect it will continue to grow as the city expands its infrastructure.
Is there a model city that you have visited in which Toronto should get ideas for better bike infrastructure?
[KM] I haven’t consciously noticed this aspect when I have travelled but I’m sure I will now. The Bixi program in Montreal seems interesting, and I hope it takes off here.
Do you know someone who has recently started using a bicycle for transportation, and would possibly be willing to do an interview? If so, please contact us!
James D. Schwartz is the editor of The Urban Country. You can contact James at james.schwartz@theurbancountry.com.
Related Articles:
- Biking It My Way (Apr 2010)
- A Beautiful Morning in Toronto (June 2010)
- Toronto Inches Forward At Record Speed (April 2010)
- Car Culture Bleeds Our Society (Aug 2010)
Interview With Cycling Newcomer Kerri McKenna
0 commentsBeijing traffic jam photo courtesy of Proggie (this is not the 100KM traffic jam)
For several decades, the Chinese managed to transport millions and millions of people efficiently around their cities - primarily by bicycle. There are reportedly 450 million bicycles in China, and the bicycle has served as a great tool historically.
Now, enter the world of the automobile. The Chinese have been making room for the automobile as their economy expands and wealth increases. But the automobile simply can’t support the same capacity that the bicycle can – and capacity is everything in a country of 1.3+ billion people with more than 160 cities with one or more million people.
The predicament that the Chinese are facing became evident to people around the world when the 100KM, 9-day traffic jam on the Beijing-Tibet “Expressway” was reported today by the CBC, CNN, and a Chinese English news agency, among others.
The traffic jam has stranded mostly truck drivers for reportedly 9 days, and many are playing cards to pass the time.
For a moment, forget about all the negative things that result from automobiles. Let’s assume that car’s don’t pollute, emit carbon, take very little resources to produce, and don’t consume fossil fuels or require electricity to operate (almost sounds like a bicycle, eh?).
Even if this were the case, there simply isn’t enough room or cars. They are too bulky - taking up too much space, and there isn’t enough land to pave over to accommodate everyone in the world driving an automobile.
This is a reality that the Chinese will face as car ownership increases. In 2007 I sat in a Beijing traffic jam, and I was fascinated by the extremely wide highways at full capacity – and it can only get worse.
This is where the bicycle comes in. It is a proven tool that the Chinese have relied upon for many decades.
Here’s a live version of one of my favourite songs of all time – Nine Million Bicycles by Katie Melua:
Here’s a Chinese traffic jam in Chengdu Sichuan:
Photo courtesy of Mike Lowell
“Progress” is not taking ideas from cities like Los Angeles to solve transportation issues. Progress is taking something that has been trusty and proven for the last 100 years – the bicycle - and building upon its successes.
Thankfully, the Chinese government hasn’t turned its back on the bicycle (not yet at least). When I visited earlier this year, I saw great, wide, segregated bicycle infrastructure being built in Chinese suburbs.
Hopefully the 9-day, 100KM-long traffic jam will make people realize they had it better off before the automobile came along.
The last thing China needs is to expand its road capacity only to have a 200KM, 18-day traffic jam 2 years later.
James D. Schwartz is the editor of The Urban Country. You can contact James at james.schwartz@theurbancountry.com.
Related Articles:
- Utility Cycling in China (May 2010)
- Shanghai Cycle Chic (May 2010)
- Suburban Bike Infrastructure (March 2010)
- Bicycles for Transporting… [fill in the blank] (May 2010)
- Car Culture Bleeds Our Society (Aug 2010)
China’s Mega 100KM Traffic Jam
2 commentsPhoto “Toy Cars” courtesy of Andrew Dai
In North America, everywhere you look car manufacturers are trying to entice you to buy their brand. Car ads are absolutely everywhere. It’s part of our culture and you can’t avoid it – our society is brainwashed to have an affection for automobiles.
As a kid, I distinctly recall the pride and joy in my father’s eyes when he bought his first new car – a grey 1985 Ford Thunderbird. I remember that first drive we went on, and how he had to buckle me in the back with his pants belt because the car only came equipped with 2 seatbelts in the back (there were 3 of us).
Overseas, the same virus is sweeping over Asia. In China, children are being introduced to luxury car brands at a very young age through educational materials.
Photo courtesy of Patrick Chovanec
It’s hard to eradicate the indoctrination of the automobile marketing machines; especially when they reach you at a very early age. The first 7 or so years of our lives are the most important development years that will shape us for the rest of our lives.
As a kid growing up, most of my hobbies involved cars. From my “dinky cars”, to model cars, to sandbox trucks, to the Power Wheels jeep that I always wanted - but only the rich kids seemed to get.
Photo by Will White
Over the years, those Power Wheels cars have evolved. Check out these stylish Mercedes SLK roadsters for kids being sold in China:
Photo courtesy of Patrick Chovanec
What kid growing up in this environment wouldn’t be looking forward to driving a car when they become of age?
Frankly, it’s amazing car companies aren’t handing out free toy cars at schools. Auto manufacturers of course aren’t strategic enough to invest that far in the future since it’s all about shareholder value – right now.
The problem of course with our addiction to cars is that it has resulted in a slew of problems for our society. It has encouraged developers to push further and further into forest and farm land, displacing animals and eliminating farms. People are living farther and farther away from their workplace and spending countless hours in their cars commuting. With less time to exercise, we are seeing soaring obesity rates.
Cars have also been the largest contributor to our oil addiction – leading to disasters like the Gulf Oil spill and countless wars for control over oil states.
The other issue with automobiles and one that perhaps resonates with drivers, is that there simply isn’t enough space to support our population levels. People migrated to California because they wanted bigger homes and more park space. Instead, they got wide highways, atrocious traffic jams, and no time to enjoy their big homes and park space.
Bikes are an affordable, proven tool
Bikes on the other hand are an affordable, proven tool that can help us reduce our reliance on automobiles. But when it comes to safety, our perception is too easily influenced by those who feel threatened by any changes to our current way of life.
Take utility cycling as an example. Although there are many barriers to prevent people from using their bike for transportation, the one I hear most often in Toronto is the lack of comfort and the lack of safety because of all the cars.
The media tends to exaggerate the dangers of cycling whenever an incident occurs. Motorist deaths here in Toronto is so common that it barely gets reported. Cyclist deaths are so uncommon that they get extra attention in the media, resulting in a perception of danger that is unwarranted.
It’s not surprising, because there are institutions that profit from your fear. If a hundred thousand more people decide to ride their bikes for transportation and get rid of their cars, the auto manufacturers and oil companies will suffer. They profit from your fears by instilling in you a perception of safety and comfort for driving cars, and a perception of risk and danger for riding bicycles.
But let’s look at the data to see if the safety angle is misguided. For every million hours of travel, bicyclists experience 0.41 fatalities. For the same million hours of travel, a car occupant will experience 0.46 fatalities. The number fares even worse for pedestrians at 0.80 fatalities for every million hours of travel, and motorcyclists experience 7.50 fatalities.
Keep in mind that drivers and motorcyclists are required to be trained and licensed, whereas the pedestrian and bicyclist fatalities include children and licenses and training are not required.
When it comes to hospital admissions for head injuries, bicyclists experience 2.2 head injuries for every million hours of travel, while that number is 2.0 for pedestrians, 1.6 for drivers, and 18.0 for motorcyclists.
So in looking at these statistics, riding a bicycle is a comparable risk to driving an automobile. But people don’t look at scientific data to assess their risk. The perception is that riding a bicycle is far riskier than driving a car.
There’s a reason why auto manufacturers don’t show you videos of mangled body parts spread along a highway, or crushed torsos from a head-on collision. Instead, they show you smooth, quiet, comfortable automobiles, with endless safety features and thrilling corners and great acceleration.
Sometimes you might even see a bicycle in an automobile commercial, but the cyclists are painted as risk takers, pulling dangerous manoeuvres, traveling at high speeds, zig-zagging through traffic.
Of course they are showing you this to keep cyclists and drivers divided and prevent you from ever considering giving up your beloved automobile for a bicycle.
This is a tactic to validate that you made a wise decision in driving your car instead of “risking it” on a bike. Why would Mercedes have any interest in making bicycling appear to be safe? Bicycles are a threat to their revenue stream.
You would never see an auto manufacturer include a video like this in one of their commercials:
These are everyday people riding bicycles for transportation. Gaining their daily exercise while traveling to work or to the store, and having more time to spend with their families instead of sitting inside an automobile.
A city’s culture doesn’t get much better than that.
James D. Schwartz is the editor of The Urban Country. You can contact James at james.schwartz@theurbancountry.com.
Related Articles:
- Refusing To Be Herded Like Cattle (Aug 2010)
- A Beautiful Morning in Toronto (Jun 2010)
- United States Moving Forward After Decades of Neglect (March 2010)
- I Am Responsible for the Gulf Oil Spill (June 2010)
Car Culture Bleeds Our Society
3 commentsPhoto courtesy of Mully Children’s Family
A good friend of mine bought a thoughtful gift for me for my Champagne Birthday back in June. The book was written by BikeSnobNYC (Eben Weiss) and it provides an amusing and entertaining dissection of the world of cycling.
From the back cover:
“In this wickedly funny rant and rave about the world of bikes and their riders, blogger and cyclist BikeSnobNYC offers a unique look at the ins and outs of cycling, from its history and hallmarks to its wide range of bizarre practitioners. He spares no one, not even himself, as he lampoons the missteps, pretensions, and absurdities of bike culture, all while maintaining a contagious enthusiasm for cycling itself.”
The book touches on different aspects of cycling culture, including the history of the bicycle, the different types of cyclists, road rules, and advanced cycling.
According to BikeSnobNYC’s descriptions of different types of cyclists, I would be categorized as “The Righteous Cyclist”.
“The Laden Righteous Cyclist, who makes a point of transporting unwieldy objects by bicycle or even moving to a new apartment by bicycle. (This is to reduce vehicular emissions, even though the miles of traffic that forms behind the Laden Righteous Cyclist more than makes up for the three gallons of gas they might have saved by not using a car to bring home the new-to-them couch)”
“Also, all of these (Righteous) cyclists will take great pains to remind you that they don’t have a car, unless they can afford to own a car or a parent or relative gave them a car, in which case they will provide a lengthy rationale and tell you how they never use it”
BikeSnobNYC takes amusing shots at several other cyclist personas, including the following:
The Messenger
“Like cobblers, blacksmiths, cowboys, and Luke Wilson, bicycle messengers continue to exist despite increasing irrelevance and a constantly shrinking demand for their labors.”
Refusing To Be Herded Like Cattle
0 commentsImage courtesy of toronto.bixi.com
BIXI is coming to Toronto – for real this time. Well, unless it gets cancelled again. But it seems more real this year than last year – for real.
I’m proud to say that I am now one of the 1,000 “founding members” of Toronto’s BIXI program. For less than a monthly metro pass, I in turn receive a full-year bicycle rental membership with BIXI – granting me the right to use BIXI bicycles for free for up to 30-minutes for an entire year.
I attended the “BIXI bash” last Wednesday at the Gladstone hotel, but the BIXI folks were too busy signing up other enthusiastic new BIXI members – so I opted to do it online instead.
I have been an ardent supporter of BIXI since I took Montreal’s BIXI’s out for a test ride in July 2009. Despite its early flaws which I pointed out in that article (most of which have been rectified), I found the system to be a great step forward for urban cycling.
The concept is amazing - almost everywhere you look you can find a BIXI bike station waiting for you to hop on and instantly and magically become an urban utility cyclist without worrying about whether your bike will be stolen, or dealing with that flat tire that you haven’t got around to fixing for a few weeks.
Or perhaps you live in the suburbs and travel by train or public transit when you go downtown. BIXI will be there waiting for you too like a great friend who is always there to pick you up at the airport.
Or maybe you don’t even own a bike - don’t worry, BIXI won’t hold it against you.
And I’m not the only one who thinks BIXI is a great idea – the program has exploded to cities around the world, including Melbourne, Boston, Washington, and Minneapolis. Most recently, BIXI launched in London, UK with more than 6,000 bikes at 400 stations for its first phase.
BIXI Coming to Town
5 commentsAll Photos by James D. Schwartz / The Urban Country
Each year my friends and I set forth on a 6-day epic journey in the interior of the beautiful 7,653 sq km Algonquin Provincial Park. Using only human power to reach the interior, we are much obliged to enjoy the serenity of the nature in a preserved, non-motorized natural environment.
Interior camping provides the rich opportunity to experience the world as it was before humans interfered with the natural environment - a world without the conveniences of civilized life. It also teaches some survival skills that so many people lack in the comfort of modern life.
Algonquin Park’s natural beauty could turn anyone into a naturist – but Algonquin Park wouldn’t be what it is today without the help of our government in conjunction with selfless individuals who fought for its protection from development.
Without this protection, Algonquin Park could have easily become a cluster of cottage-ridden lakes, with the smell of motor boat exhaust fumes and the sound of boats speeding by - all common traits of thousands of ruined Ontario lakes at the hands of wealthy cottage dwellers who believe that their personal pleasure is more important than preserving our natural environment.
Instead, the Algonquin Park Act was passed by the Ontario Legislature in 1893 to allow the park to serve as a wildlife sanctuary and to exclude agriculture to protect the rivers that flow from Algonquin Park.





