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“Cars Kill So Many People It Staggers The Imagination” 5

“Cars Kill So Many People It Staggers The Imagination”
Car crash carnage – Photo courtesy of Atomic Hot Links  Yesterday we discussed how bicyclists are encouraged to break the law because of bad road design. Coincidentally, on the same day the Toronto Star wrote an article entitled “Lawbreaking cyclists putting everyone in danger”. The author cites a middle age woman who was riding the ...

You Are Wasting Your Life Away Sitting In Traffic… 9

You Are Wasting Your Life Away Sitting In Traffic…
… But at least you aren’t on a bicycle. Or so that’s the message being portrayed by the local newspaper’s automobile section. Every year we see more and more bicycles on the streets here in Toronto. Instead of acknowledging that more people on bicycles means less traffic congestion for car drivers, many drivers seem to ...

Ignoring Careless, Dangerous Driving 6

Ignoring Careless, Dangerous Driving
Pedestrian Crossing Lights – Photo courtesy of Dave Delaney On Monday morning, nine pedestrians were hit by cars in Toronto in under an hour – between 6:41AM and 7:24AM, according to the Toronto Star. These incidents triggered an infuriating PR campaign by Constable Client Stibbe on Twitter where he tore the victims a new one ...

Motorist Convenience Trumps Safety 43

Motorist Convenience Trumps Safety
“Driving the Volvo” – Photo by Thomas Anderson Toronto’s chief medical officer made headlines in the Toronto media for recommending that the city reduce its speed limits to 30km/h on residential streets, and 40km/h on other city streets to “support the increased use and safety of walking and cycling”. The Doctor’s recommendations were mocked by ...

A Renewed Faith in Newspapers 8

A Renewed Faith in Newspapers
“Places To Go, People To Meet, Things To Do” by Amsterdamize (via ratemyvelo.com) Over the years as a citizen bicycling advocate I have lost my faith in the media. I had found that news outlets have a bias toward car culture that has contributed to the animosity on our streets and the stifling of progress ...

Tell Cyclists To Follow The Rules 57

Tell Cyclists To Follow The Rules
“Cargo Bike” – Photo by Mario Jahn / RateMyVelo.com It was bound to happen. A newspaper column politely asking drivers to share the road and accept cyclists as fellow travellers rather than adversaries, published in a newspaper with a readership of ~1 million people, was bound to stir up some controversy. As expected, I woke ...

Toronto Newspaper Columnist Sees The Light 60

Toronto Newspaper Columnist Sees The Light
Photo of James Schwartz cycling through a typical non-accommodating Toronto construction zone – Jack Lakey / Toronto Star In July I posted a response to what I felt was an ill-written newspaper column which antagonized cyclists for their apparent blatant disregard for traffic laws. I felt the article only served to create more animosity on ...

“The Fixer” Not Fixing Anything 30

“The Fixer” Not Fixing Anything
Photo of a cyclist passing the photographer who was probably blocking the right lane. Photo by Jack Lakey / Toronto Star Below is an open letter from me to a Toronto Star writer Jack Lakey, who calls himself “The Fixer” because he fixes things that are “broken in your neighbourhood”. The Fixer recently wrote an ...