Cycling advocates celebrated an Earth Day win earlier this week after a judge granted a temporary injunction preventing the Ontario government from tearing out three Toronto bike lanes.

“The temporary injunction guarantees that the provincial government cannot move forward with removing bike lanes before the judge can make his decision on the merits of the applicants’ Charter challenge,” writes Ecojustice, the environmental law charity that filed the case on behalf of Cycle Toronto and cyclists Eva Stanger-Ross and Narada Kiondo. “The decision goes on to say that failing to suspend the provision mandating removal of the three bike lanes will cause more harm to the public interest than allowing the removal to begin while the matter is under reserve.”

The decision followed a hearing last week where lawyers from Ecojustice and Paliare Roland LLP challenged a section of Ontario’s Reducing Gridlock, Saving You Time Act that mandates removal of bike lanes along Bloor St., University Ave., and Yonge St. in downtown Toronto.

“We’re pleased that the court noted the public interest in encouraging cycling as a means of transportation,” Ecojustice lawyer Bronwyn Roe said in the release. “As we’ve said time and again, the Ontario government should be investing in safe, reliable, active transit that is better for people and the planet—not locking in car dependence while putting the lives of Ontarians at increased risk.”

“Ripping out bike lanes won’t solve congestion and will put people’s lives at risk,” said Cycle Toronto member Michael Longfield. “Today’s ruling should make clear to the province to reconsider this reckless and arbitrary legislation, and instead work with municipalities on evidence-based solutions to keep all Torontonians moving.”

‘Irrational and Dangerous’

Last week, the lawyers argued Ontario’s “irrational and dangerous” bid to remove the three bike lanes should be ruled unconstitutional, after the province’s own internal advice and experts suggest the move won’t accomplish its stated goal to ease congestion, The Canadian Press reported April 16.

“It’s a narrow challenge to what we see as the irrational and dangerous ways that this government has chosen to remove these bike lanes,” said lawyer Andrew Lewis.

Stanger-Ross, a university student who relies on the Bloor Street bike lane to get to school, and Kiondo, a bike delivery driver who uses the lanes daily, argued the province’s bid to remove the lanes would violate their constitutional right to life and had no connection to its stated objective to reduce congestion. The bill could even make traffic worse, they suggest.

A lawyer for the government argued Wednesday that removing bike lanes would not violate the Constitution.

Bike lanes were put in place under provincial law to reduce the danger posed by drivers, lawyer Josh Hunter said, and the government could choose to take away that risk reduction measure for other reasons, such as to ease congestion.

“No one’s saying the government is causing the harm. It’s the drivers on the road that’s causing the harm,” said Hunter.

Six cyclists were killed in Toronto last year, all on roads without protected bike lanes, a lawyer for the cyclists said.

Premier Doug Ford’s Progressive Conservative government has said the law passed last year, which also requires municipalities across Ontario to get the province’s approval for bike lanes that cut into vehicle traffic, was a bid to fight traffic gridlock.

Provincial Documents Undercut Removal Plan

Lewis used the government’s own internal documents to try to undercut that claim.

He said a document signed by the minister of transportation on Sept. 9, 2024, advised that the government’s plan “may not reduce congestion.”

He said a Ministry of Transportation briefing note dated Oct. 28, a week after the government introduced the bike lane bill, stated that “removing cycling infrastructure may not have the desired goal of reducing congestion.”

Lewis also cited an engineering report, commissioned by the government and finalized earlier this year, that found while removing the bike lanes might increase vehicle capacity, the actual alleviation of congestion may be “negligible or short-lived.”

The same report also found bike lanes were predicted to reduce crashes involving cyclists, pedestrians, and motorists by between 35 and 50%, Lewis said.

“Those facts were kept from the public until produced here, while (the government was) engaging in a public relations campaign to the contrary,” he said.

Hunter, the government lawyer, argued the law was connected to its purpose: to increase the space available for cars.

“Two lanes is more than one,” he said.

In response, Justice Paul Schabas suggested some traffic experts may question whether adding more lanes would just induce more traffic, and congestion could wind up just as bad as it was before the bike lanes were removed.

Hunter suggested a study prepared by a Toronto Metropolitan University professor and submitted as evidence found travel times worsened after the bike lanes were installed.

But Schabas took issue with that report, too, and how it compared travel times in 2020, when “hardly anybody was on the road” due to the pandemic, with times in 2021, when it was “a little busier”.

“I found that very odd,” he said.

Chow Seeks a ‘Win-Win’

The bike lane issue has sparked protests by the public and pushback from the City of Toronto. Mayor Olivia Chow and the city have proposed a solution to the province that would allow for a car lane to be returned to those roads while also keeping a bike lane.

A spokesperson for Chow said the mayor is committed to achieving a “win-win solution with the province.”

“Discussions with the province are ongoing,” Zeus Eden said in a statement.

Earlier this month, a spokesperson for the provincial transportation minister suggested the government was open to collaboration with the city, provided it funds its portion of infrastructure needs.

Ford’s recent re-election campaign included fresh promises to reduce traffic congestion. He has cited the bike lane on Bloor Street, not far from his own home, in describing the issues he hopes to address.

The premier has said he’s not against bike lanes but prefers them on secondary routes.

Lawyers for the cyclists argue there’s no evidence that cyclists would avoid arterial roads and cite Toronto’s city manager as saying there’s no feasible parallel alternative that wouldn’t cut into traffic lanes.

The initial stretch of the Bloor bike lane was installed in 2016, then extended several times since the start of the pandemic. It stretches around 13 kilometres from near Islington Avenue, in Toronto’s west end, to Castle Frank east of Yonge.

Temporary University Avenue bike lanes installed in 2020 were made permanent in 2021, the same year the Yonge Street lanes were installed.

The main body of this story was first published by The Canadian Press on April 16, 2024.