I'm going to be real honest. Toronto might be the last ever major city in North America to have a car free street on a regular basis. Montreal already has that. Colarado. Washington.
Yep, even Detroit of all places added a car free street a few years ago:
https://www.reddit.com/r/notjustbikes/comments/y840bc/w_columbia_street_pedestrianized_downtown_detroit/
Just a small 65% population decline since 1950.
And we somehow think it’s “more supply” that will make housing cheaper. Detroit figured it out: less demand works a lot better.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Demographic_history_of_Detroit
You didn’t actually just say that DETROIT figured out housing, right? The city’s (white / wealthy) entire population moved out to the suburbs and the city went bankrupt - that is not a model we want to emulate.
sure sure but, cheap housing, in the city *and* in those suburbs.
And white wealthy people are overrated.
City bankruptcy does sound like bad news, if you're a banker or lender.
Only 6 days per year though (last Sunday May through October). We could do so much more! Montreal does a dozen streets for months at a time each summer.
Toronto *already* has a bunch of car-free streets. Cibola Avenue, Lakeshore Avenue ... I recall at one point Toronto had the largest batch of car-free streets in North America, I'm not sure if that's still true ...
OP’s suggestion is wild. It’s a span of like 15-20 km. Is that what other cities do? On such a major route?
Like does Montreal shut down St Catherine’s or St Laurent for 15 km? I doubt it…
Okay so same question but 7 km lol
I’m not sure so I’m asking, I’ve been to and lived in other places, they never had a stretch anywhere close to that shut down to that extent
Edit: interesting, suddenly no one telling me I’m wrong? Just quiet downvotes
My point was the distance, whether it’s comparable. Most cities do shut down some streets for events and such but the distance here was the crux of my point
I was curious if they’re 8-9 km which is more what we’re dealing with here.
That wasn’t the question.
Absolutely nobody has responded to me and explain that I’m wrong, only beating around the bush or quiet down votes. So I’m inclined to think that I’m correct and there is no planned shut down this scope and so all the silly comparisons being sent to me are just not the same as what we’re discussing here .
I asked the question in good faith and since nobody has given me any information to the contrary, I’m going to assume I’m right
One thing that the question you posed doesn’t take into account is the fact that because of the valleys running through the city, the parallel streets often don’t actually cross the same span of distance. So you would just be creating a whole other host of traffic problems. This wouldn’t just affect cars, it would affect other transit users on other routes. So you might have Shuttle bus users on Danforth getting along OK but now you push so much traffic onto the auxiliary streets available that street car users, for example, can’t get around and then they would be here complaining
I never argued “it’s too long to close”
I posited the ideaof whether it’s actually feasible and when folks suggested it happens all the time I simply asked whether it’s actually true at this scope of a project. What is wrong with that? Are you not capable of discussing the pros and cons, and feasibility without encroaching on your personal opinion? Like fuck me for asking a question lol
I never made an argument based on my opinion
I’m going to be a real honest with you as well. Toronto is the only large city that has the shittiest subway system throughout the developed world. How about that?
By North American big city standards TTC is doing pretty well. Even better than other cities in NA that have pedestrianized streets. By EU/Asia (or developed world) standards they are doing pretty bad. How about that?
Toronto could be so cool like that, imagine living in Barrie or a neighbouring city and wanting to go downtown, hop on a train, get over in like 30 minutes, hop off, and not get immediately smoked by a car for simply tryna cross the street. A man can dream. Like for real Toronto has so much good food and cool stores I wanna go too but fuck the traffic and fuck the drivers even harder that make it 10X worse
Of course not. We can’t handle it, i can’t fathom a city voluntarily shutting down that much roadway.
No where I’ve travelled or lived ever shut down a stretch anywhere close to that
Which one?
There are 5 BIA’s along the danforth, and as someone who has lived and worked on it for decades, they are rarely aligned in policies or campaigns
Greektown--actively campaigned against removal of parking during subway shutdowns. Spoke with Councillor Fletcher's office during the time and heard it from her assistant.
I'd prefer they called them "Community Improvement Associations", and they would let the entire community be involved. For the one in my neighborhood, it ONLY allows business owners, and they won't quit complaining about bike lanes and wanting street parking.
My BIA is quite new and the area hasn't really gentrified, so maybe it's unique to me.
I'd just love to have input into the BIA.
You can thank the bia's and the Counseller for whenever you see streetcars piled up outside Broadview waiting to get in. The current king platform was supposed to have been modified to fit 2 streetcars by now but it was cancelled because green p spots would be lost.
Pro tip if coming from the east heading downtown:
Hop off the subway at Main Street, take a 62 or 87 all the way over to Broadview Station, then take a 504 or 505. Alternately, just hop on a 506 across.
If heading to the west end, take a 34 then 32 across. Then transfer to anything heading south on your desired street.
I live by Woodbine and ended up just walking to Main and taking the GO Train downtown. Only 40 cents more and saved so much time. Tomorrow, I might take 506 all the way west.
don't do that, College is torn up... streetcars are out. one "live" lane in each direction with articulated buses. it's a shitshow.... not even enough room to weave anywhere safely on a bike. i ended up walking my bike on the sidewalk a couple of blocks until i get find a way south to Dundas as my e/w route
AVOID COLLEGE/506
The 87 is a great alternative! 62 is alright, but comes every 20 minutes which is a bummer. Although depending where one is, GO would probably be better.
It’s impossible.
Advocates for the elderly and disabled will fight it like their life depends on it because someone who has a car might have difficulties.
Just don’t count on a single one of those “advocates” to even pretend to give a shit about hospitals, access to doctors, clean air, masking in healthcare settings, improving LTCs, increasing benefits, etc.
Maybe I am totally off, but I am pretty sure I have been to places where the streets were "car-free" but they still allowed for emergency vehicles and even taxis to pick people up and drop people off within those car-free areas. If there were specific exemptions (like ambulances, or like Red Cross transportation shuttles/DARTS, and public transit, that would provide a whole lot of options for people with limited mobility and probably create way more buy-in with people.
> Just don’t count on a single one of those “advocates” to even pretend to give a shit about hospitals, access to doctors, clean air, masking in healthcare settings, improving LTCs, increasing benefits, etc.
Seriously. A lot of people defend cars yet they won't defend ways to prevent/mitigate injuries that cause disabilities. If we had safer roads and fewer cars, you could reduce the amount of disabled people. I heard a study a while ago claim that there is a fairly strong correlation between how much you drive instead of walk and how likely you are to end up with cancer or struggle to walk at an older age.
Counterpoint:
I’m disabled enough that the current public transit is unsafe for me to use
I have balance issues and multiple serious injuries mean I always need a seat and getting up and out of a bus/subway train is a slow process that the transit system doesn’t take into account.
But I can still drive safely so 🤷♂️
Yes standing is the main issue as is getting up off of a seat if the seat is too low (I’ve had to purchase vehicles that I can slide into in order to sit in them)
Counter counter point, if we could get TPS to actually enforce anything, we could have a system where disabled folks are still allowed to drive on a “transit only” road—like how accessible parking spots work. It’s win-win.
It’s as if the elderly and the disabled don’t rely on transit to get around!
If these “advocates” actually cared for these individuals they’d want the transit available to them to be efficient and the fastest moving.
And if you cared as much about disabled people as you say you do, you'd advocate for letting them get around the city in a way that's compatible with their disability.
Lots and lots of disabled people can't use regular public transit.
You're not wrong that there are lots of disabled people that can't use public transit even if its overall quality/frequency/speed/convenience was at EU standards. However, a lot of disabled people cannot drive nor afford a personal car. What /u/falseidentity123 is trying to say is a lot of disability advocates tend to focus on cars as the primary or go-to solution to accessibility problems while mostly ignoring petitions to improve transit's accessibility. It's not making accessibility problem better by adding more places to park. Disabled people need alternatives to relying on a car.
Lol, honestly the TTC doesn't have a good backup when the subway is down. It's 100% going to be a shitshow.
I'd love if they one day committed to redesign the city to be less car-centric and more friendly & consistent with public transit/cycling like the Netherlands for example. But we all know they'll never do that even if that's the best way to move people around.
It really doesn't help that building a completely new line takes decades. If Eglinton Crosstown was up and running by now, it would at least alleviate a part of the crowd. Obviously not everyone who uses Line 2 would've used Crosstown but given that it is the only road that crosses all 6 boroughs of Toronto, a good portion could've taken that. We should've had alternative lines. It's too heavily reliant on Lines 1 and 2.
Yep, some redundancy would definitely take strain away from certain lines and give some flexibility if you have to re-route. That's something I did like about NYC and other similar transit networks.
I still can't believe it's taken the Crosstown this long to get going. I was in highschool when it started and now I'm in my 30s lol. I have no confidence in them building any new infrastructure in a timely fashion.
The crosstown lessons are being learned, the Ontario Line will have a simpler contract structure so a lot of the foolery that happened with Line 5 is unlikely to happen with the Ontario Line.
Thats without getting into a plethora of other issues that Line 5 has had to deal with. I get the frustration, but they're learning - albeit a little slowly.
bloor line is down and college being torn up on the same weekend.... between the city and the transit commission I'm not sure which one less adept at thinking things through
It's the lesser of many evils unfortunately. Less traffic on the weekends so that's the best time to do it with the least amount of disruptions. Not having redundancies definitely hurts them in this regard. Once any part of the subway line is down it's chaos.
“We don’t send out shuttle busses until 30 minutes after a delay just to be sure there is a delay”
Legit word for word what a TTC worker told me when a station lost power a few weeks ago
“We know the problem, we don’t know how long it will take to fix, so to be sure we wait 30 minutes before we call for them”
When they did call for them, at this point you have several school trips going on, massive crowds of people unsure of where to go, and the entire station looks like a concert with how many people. TTC infrastructure is absolute trash.
Part of the problem is they don’t have many buses just hanging around on standby for this. They have to pull them out of service from other lines and bring them over.
not sure if you know but in Toronto one doesn't need a bike to use the bike lane, just an inflated sense of entitlement and with that one can use their car or go jogging with their dog
I know what you mean. Why do some people so entitled? I see bikes on sidewalks all the time. I’ve even seen bikes going the wrong way in narrow bike lanes. Maybe they wanted to avoid the sidewalks.
> I see bikes on sidewalks all the time. I’ve even seen bikes going the wrong way in narrow bike lanes.
It's more than likely Uber Eats delivery workers. They'll do whatever 'shortcut' it takes to get to their delivery faster.
ya, i don't move for either. i definitely don't move for the ebikes on the sidewalk, i will legit post right in their path. or feign a clothesline
it's usually the same type going the wrong way in the bike lane as well
like i said.... all that's needed is an inflated sense of entitlement and the Toronto public spaces can be your playground.
Danforth should automatically convert to a BRT any time the subway shuts down.
All cars can take the ‘side streets’ we hear so much about whenever a bike lane is proposed.
Drivers are only 8% of people moving through the Corridor, to give you a sense of the baked-in privilege.
They should eliminate parking on Danforth for that time and make the parking spots BRT and have a hive of parking cops around to ensure no one parks 'just for a sec'. I live on an E/W street very close to Danforth and lots of kids play on the streets around here and I just know people would drive like absolute morons if they were forced to rat-run through the nearby neighbourhoods.
Surely drivers already do that when the subway breaks down? A certain proportion of people must go to their Google Maps?
And yes, a scheme to stop rat-running and shove drivers onto Dundas or O’Connor should be twinned with that.
Unfortunately with the Complete Streets eliminating parking doesn’t provide a straight shot over a whole bunch of stretches. Parking tends to be in bays. However, it would allow for more freedom of movement of buses - and for passage of emergency vehicles.
But yah, this is all rehearsal for a future where the Bloor Danforth line is overloaded and we need BRT anyways!
Toronto.ca/DanforthStudy - it’s one of the pie charts - saw it at a public display consultation as well - did a double-take.
‘You mean THAT is the source of all the barking?’
Not a crazy thought at all but unfortunately clown politicians won’t turn kensington or yonge-dundas area car-free so there’s no way they’d stop car traffic on a strech of road across the city :/
So they are shutting down the subway line again next weekend,
https://www.ttc.ca/service-advisories/subway-service/2-Line-2-Bloor-Danforth-Woodbine-to-Kennedy-full-weekend-closure-April-20-and-21
Do we uhm, wanna maybe go set up some barricades?
With the lack of parking and bike lanes that is not a bad idea. However you would have to contend with lots of one way streets that meet head on at Bloor.
It's not always black and white when it comes to defining car-free. Some car-free streets have transit like in the Netherlands. Some have just pedestrians. Some allow both pedestrians and cyclists. At the end of the day, car-free most likely means free of single occupant private vehicles.
For Ottawa city center and downtown Toronto I'd say a single passenger free set of streets would make sense, cyclists in their own defined area is fine too, but any motorized vehicles (busses, taxi or any other Muti person) means you need to waste all the space anyways and seemingly defeats the purpose
This is the exact reason I drive my car. So much wasted potential in this city. If we had proper dedicated lanes for transit I would sell my car so fast
My professional success requires me to know that they are but ok.
i remain financially comfortable in an industry and a city where few are, but i guess that was the result of luck and not bookkeeping. Ill go let the rest of the food and bev businesses on the street know.
Expansive infrastructure will always require some repairs to stay operational, and having more subways would make shutting down Bloor-Danforth for repairs far less of an inconvenience. If Eglinton was up and running then people needing to head east or west across the city would have an easy alternative option.
Agree 100% on that statement, but that would be too efficient, and this is Toronto after all, efficiency does not show up in the planners vernacularity.
There is also the possibility of taking that parking away and turning into a bus lane temporarily, but I don’t think all of Bloor Danforth has a parking lane in all parts.
I live by Vic Park and Danforth, and I know there’s no parking on the south side by Shoppers World (presumably due to the fact that Shoppers World is really a suburban plaza). More so, I tend to agree with OP, but I can’t see that happening in a city with a big car addiction unfortunately.
Hopefully!! Based on what I hear about how bad that bus is, dedicated bus lanes are long overdue. Really, all arterials in Toronto should have RapidTO lanes, ESPECIALLY the 3 lane stroads!
Question is why can't the workers who are fixing the subway do it off hours when the subways aren't running. Why must they have to inconvenience everyone who uses the subway, especially this long of a stretch of stops. Taking the shuttle bus is a pain and it delays everything , since it doesn't hold the same amount of volume of passengers.
I remember reading an article that asked business owners on Bloor what percentage of their customers drove to their businesses. The owners answered in the range of 25%, when it was actually 4%.
Probably considering that 95% of the customers to those business either live in the area or get their by transit, I wouldn’t be that fuzzed.
Also…Danforth itself has very limited parking available, people that drive to those businesses probably drive to those side streets to park. Which they can still get to if the Danforth was closed to car traffic.
Zero customers actually since the spot in front of the store is taken by the owner. What they're arguing for here personal convenience, even to the detriment of their business.
They always are, and studies show that business owners always overestimate how many of their customers drive to them. There's plenty of parallel routes and parking for those who'd prefer it.
Countless studies have shown that restricting streets to cars increases customer traffic and sales for businesses. I agree it's counterintuitive, but these business owners should know better.
It’s fascinating how all these businesses in highly populated areas surrounded by mass transit live and die based on if one person can park in front of their store for 2 hours
I guess why bother catering to the thousands of people living near you when you depend on one person driving in from Innisfil to spend $10
Sad news for you. Bike lanes are actually better for a business than we think. This post isn't about bike lanes but the concept of increasing non-car trips helps businesses.
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2021-12-08/for-store-owners-bike-lanes-boost-the-bottom-line
How much more money we need to throw in the subway system that does not work. Have you guys ever taken the subway system in Paris in Italy in New York and Japan in China in Sydney? Australia in Albania? Let alone here in Canada time unbelievable how awkward everything is?
Haha op got inconvenienced and wants Toronto to cater to them. Typical Reddit post. Hey maybe get a car if it’s such an issue. If not then put your headphones in and shut the fuck up like the rest of us living in the largest city in the country.
You're 100% correct as someone who lives and works on the danforth that fucking bike lane they put in has caused nothing but problems and there is someone going by using it as intended once ever...what 10 min..if that
On street parking has always been there and was never an issue. It's the bike lanes. I remember a drive from VP to Donalds only took 8 minutes. Now it's nearly 20
Look at 7 Bathurst bus going north of the station. No bike lanes. Just on-street parking. It's always a slow congested area. You really underestimate just how severely bad on-street parking is. You have drivers that are pulling in and out which severely slow down traffic. You have buses that need to pass parked cars. You also have people getting in and out of their cars that don't look for traffic on their left. The only reason you think it's never an issue is because the issues that on-street parking poses is like white noise. Given that bike lanes are new to the society, it's no surprise we'd be looking for ways to blame on it. If on-street parking was implemented today, same thing.
Just finished walking along the street and just hoping that the subway will be operational the next two weekends when i'm planning to use it. Feel bad for those who dont have other options other than adding 45 mins to their commute.
Danforth as it is currently designed doesnt work at the best of times, so throw in a subway closure or construction on a nearby street and it becones a disaster for everyone but cyclists.
Truthfully the car free option for this weekend might have made the most sense as the temporary closure last Sunday for the parade probablyh caused less of a disruption than this week....but again that was for 3-4 hrs.
So the ttc is a disorganized mess, and the entire city should shut down to accomodate them? Im sorry if you have to ride the ttc, andnim sorry for everyone else on it. Still no one else needs to suffer aside from those unfortunates.
Toronto would never.
I'm going to be real honest. Toronto might be the last ever major city in North America to have a car free street on a regular basis. Montreal already has that. Colarado. Washington.
Yep, even Detroit of all places added a car free street a few years ago: https://www.reddit.com/r/notjustbikes/comments/y840bc/w_columbia_street_pedestrianized_downtown_detroit/
Detroit also had people free blocks for years.
Just a small 65% population decline since 1950. And we somehow think it’s “more supply” that will make housing cheaper. Detroit figured it out: less demand works a lot better. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Demographic_history_of_Detroit
You didn’t actually just say that DETROIT figured out housing, right? The city’s (white / wealthy) entire population moved out to the suburbs and the city went bankrupt - that is not a model we want to emulate.
sure sure but, cheap housing, in the city *and* in those suburbs. And white wealthy people are overrated. City bankruptcy does sound like bad news, if you're a banker or lender.
Or anyone who cares for public services
Yup! I heard LA does as well. I was just in Ottawa and Gatineau and both those cities have car-free streets.
Pedestrian Sundays in Kensington.
Only 6 days per year though (last Sunday May through October). We could do so much more! Montreal does a dozen streets for months at a time each summer.
Kensington should be like pedestrian zones in German cities: vehicles allowed: 10 kph speed limit.
Tbf I’ve never seen anyone do faster than 10 in Kensington
Toronto *already* has a bunch of car-free streets. Cibola Avenue, Lakeshore Avenue ... I recall at one point Toronto had the largest batch of car-free streets in North America, I'm not sure if that's still true ...
Most people don't want to take a ferry ride to experience car free streets.
Enforcement ….
OP’s suggestion is wild. It’s a span of like 15-20 km. Is that what other cities do? On such a major route? Like does Montreal shut down St Catherine’s or St Laurent for 15 km? I doubt it…
Ste-Catherine will be closed between St-Hubert and Papineau Streets, and between St-Laurent Blvd and de Bleury St all summer actually
This weekend's subway closure covers a distance of 7.3km.
Okay so same question but 7 km lol I’m not sure so I’m asking, I’ve been to and lived in other places, they never had a stretch anywhere close to that shut down to that extent Edit: interesting, suddenly no one telling me I’m wrong? Just quiet downvotes
we shut down both streets for a good number of days in the summer
My point was the distance, whether it’s comparable. Most cities do shut down some streets for events and such but the distance here was the crux of my point I was curious if they’re 8-9 km which is more what we’re dealing with here.
Are there no streets running parallel for that 8-9 km?
That wasn’t the question. Absolutely nobody has responded to me and explain that I’m wrong, only beating around the bush or quiet down votes. So I’m inclined to think that I’m correct and there is no planned shut down this scope and so all the silly comparisons being sent to me are just not the same as what we’re discussing here . I asked the question in good faith and since nobody has given me any information to the contrary, I’m going to assume I’m right One thing that the question you posed doesn’t take into account is the fact that because of the valleys running through the city, the parallel streets often don’t actually cross the same span of distance. So you would just be creating a whole other host of traffic problems. This wouldn’t just affect cars, it would affect other transit users on other routes. So you might have Shuttle bus users on Danforth getting along OK but now you push so much traffic onto the auxiliary streets available that street car users, for example, can’t get around and then they would be here complaining
> I asked the question in good faith and since nobody has given me any information to the contrary, I’m going to assume I’m right LOL
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I never argued “it’s too long to close” I posited the ideaof whether it’s actually feasible and when folks suggested it happens all the time I simply asked whether it’s actually true at this scope of a project. What is wrong with that? Are you not capable of discussing the pros and cons, and feasibility without encroaching on your personal opinion? Like fuck me for asking a question lol I never made an argument based on my opinion
I’m going to be a real honest with you as well. Toronto is the only large city that has the shittiest subway system throughout the developed world. How about that?
By North American big city standards TTC is doing pretty well. Even better than other cities in NA that have pedestrianized streets. By EU/Asia (or developed world) standards they are doing pretty bad. How about that?
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Toronto could be so cool like that, imagine living in Barrie or a neighbouring city and wanting to go downtown, hop on a train, get over in like 30 minutes, hop off, and not get immediately smoked by a car for simply tryna cross the street. A man can dream. Like for real Toronto has so much good food and cool stores I wanna go too but fuck the traffic and fuck the drivers even harder that make it 10X worse
When I lived in Mississauga I always took the go train in, i love walking around exploring, if I see somewhere cool I just dip in and look.
Of course not. We can’t handle it, i can’t fathom a city voluntarily shutting down that much roadway. No where I’ve travelled or lived ever shut down a stretch anywhere close to that
Mexico City (one of the most populated cities on the planet) does it every Sunday.
As does Paris, quite regularly. It’s great!
Had to work today. Took forever to get there on a shuttle bus.
BikeShare exists. The e-bikes are a blast and capable of much higher average speeds. On a day like today, hat and gloves is all.
Oh gosh good idea but I'm not riding any sort of bike downtown
Maybe you should stop complaining about bike lanes then?
What lol! I think the bike lanes are fab! I'm too nervous myself to ride one in this city..
Maybe you wanna work up to it! Try short little bike rides when you don’t have anywhere to go, it’s really quite enjoyable!
Yes for sure.. but this whole conversation is about biking to work.. which is downtown. No thanks! I commend others on being brave enough but not me
Totally fair, can’t get run over while riding a bike if you aren’t riding the bike!
The Danforth BIA is the problem. When parking wasn't allowed during subway closures before, they whined and complained until the city relented.
Which one? There are 5 BIA’s along the danforth, and as someone who has lived and worked on it for decades, they are rarely aligned in policies or campaigns
Greektown--actively campaigned against removal of parking during subway shutdowns. Spoke with Councillor Fletcher's office during the time and heard it from her assistant.
For real? That’s some bullshit on their part.
God dammit. Side streets exist. There’s some green p lots… like just.. get out and walk a block!
Not many ways to cross that bridge. Pottery isnt designed for that.
Side streets hardly have any parking because it's permit parking for people who live there.
Oh it gets worse. They purposely scuttled the 2022 Taste of the Danforth as a tactic to get the Cafe TO program cancelled in the area.
I’ve lived in the area for years and the more I hear the more the BIA just starts to seem like it gives no fucks for anyone who lives here. Jesus
> The Danforth BIA is the problem. they're not a legal entity that the city is obliged to listen to whatsoever. we can just ignore them if we like.
BIAs in Toronto are so hilariously bad at their jobs.
I'd prefer they called them "Community Improvement Associations", and they would let the entire community be involved. For the one in my neighborhood, it ONLY allows business owners, and they won't quit complaining about bike lanes and wanting street parking. My BIA is quite new and the area hasn't really gentrified, so maybe it's unique to me. I'd just love to have input into the BIA.
Also, fun acronym too, I guess!
You can thank the bia's and the Counseller for whenever you see streetcars piled up outside Broadview waiting to get in. The current king platform was supposed to have been modified to fit 2 streetcars by now but it was cancelled because green p spots would be lost.
Took me over an hour to get from greenwood to ossington, sadly that was only half of my journey
BikeShare my man - a fraction of the time, score one of the e-bikes for +fun
This is not a usual trip for me and definitely wasn’t dressed for a bike ride. Otherwise yes I’m a cyclist all the way
Pro tip if coming from the east heading downtown: Hop off the subway at Main Street, take a 62 or 87 all the way over to Broadview Station, then take a 504 or 505. Alternately, just hop on a 506 across. If heading to the west end, take a 34 then 32 across. Then transfer to anything heading south on your desired street.
I live by Woodbine and ended up just walking to Main and taking the GO Train downtown. Only 40 cents more and saved so much time. Tomorrow, I might take 506 all the way west.
don't do that, College is torn up... streetcars are out. one "live" lane in each direction with articulated buses. it's a shitshow.... not even enough room to weave anywhere safely on a bike. i ended up walking my bike on the sidewalk a couple of blocks until i get find a way south to Dundas as my e/w route AVOID COLLEGE/506
> AVOID COLLEGE/506 The 506 cannot catch a break. The line has been fucked for years now.
It's always been like that. When I lived at Jarvis and Carlton over a decade ago, we used to call the College car, "The Unicorn."
Yikes. Thanks for the warning!
The 87 is a great alternative! 62 is alright, but comes every 20 minutes which is a bummer. Although depending where one is, GO would probably be better.
Damn I wish I did this yesterday. Took me an hour to get to my destination cuz of the closure 😩
It’s impossible. Advocates for the elderly and disabled will fight it like their life depends on it because someone who has a car might have difficulties. Just don’t count on a single one of those “advocates” to even pretend to give a shit about hospitals, access to doctors, clean air, masking in healthcare settings, improving LTCs, increasing benefits, etc.
Maybe I am totally off, but I am pretty sure I have been to places where the streets were "car-free" but they still allowed for emergency vehicles and even taxis to pick people up and drop people off within those car-free areas. If there were specific exemptions (like ambulances, or like Red Cross transportation shuttles/DARTS, and public transit, that would provide a whole lot of options for people with limited mobility and probably create way more buy-in with people.
Almost every car free zone will have this in case of emergencies. I don't see why they shouldn't.
“Sounds like WEF propaganda to prevent disadvantaged seniors from parking their brand-new SUV in any storefront they want”
tHaT bUiLdInG wAs DrEsSeD iN dArK cLoThInG.
> Just don’t count on a single one of those “advocates” to even pretend to give a shit about hospitals, access to doctors, clean air, masking in healthcare settings, improving LTCs, increasing benefits, etc. Seriously. A lot of people defend cars yet they won't defend ways to prevent/mitigate injuries that cause disabilities. If we had safer roads and fewer cars, you could reduce the amount of disabled people. I heard a study a while ago claim that there is a fairly strong correlation between how much you drive instead of walk and how likely you are to end up with cancer or struggle to walk at an older age.
Counterpoint: I’m disabled enough that the current public transit is unsafe for me to use I have balance issues and multiple serious injuries mean I always need a seat and getting up and out of a bus/subway train is a slow process that the transit system doesn’t take into account. But I can still drive safely so 🤷♂️
I don't mean to be insensitive, but if you have balance issues, how are you able to drive safely? Is this just when you're standing?
Yes standing is the main issue as is getting up off of a seat if the seat is too low (I’ve had to purchase vehicles that I can slide into in order to sit in them)
Counter counter point, if we could get TPS to actually enforce anything, we could have a system where disabled folks are still allowed to drive on a “transit only” road—like how accessible parking spots work. It’s win-win.
That would be an interesting idea
“But I always previously magically had a parking spot right in front of wherever I drove to!” B.S.
It’s as if the elderly and the disabled don’t rely on transit to get around! If these “advocates” actually cared for these individuals they’d want the transit available to them to be efficient and the fastest moving.
And if you cared as much about disabled people as you say you do, you'd advocate for letting them get around the city in a way that's compatible with their disability. Lots and lots of disabled people can't use regular public transit.
You're not wrong that there are lots of disabled people that can't use public transit even if its overall quality/frequency/speed/convenience was at EU standards. However, a lot of disabled people cannot drive nor afford a personal car. What /u/falseidentity123 is trying to say is a lot of disability advocates tend to focus on cars as the primary or go-to solution to accessibility problems while mostly ignoring petitions to improve transit's accessibility. It's not making accessibility problem better by adding more places to park. Disabled people need alternatives to relying on a car.
Lol, honestly the TTC doesn't have a good backup when the subway is down. It's 100% going to be a shitshow. I'd love if they one day committed to redesign the city to be less car-centric and more friendly & consistent with public transit/cycling like the Netherlands for example. But we all know they'll never do that even if that's the best way to move people around.
It really doesn't help that building a completely new line takes decades. If Eglinton Crosstown was up and running by now, it would at least alleviate a part of the crowd. Obviously not everyone who uses Line 2 would've used Crosstown but given that it is the only road that crosses all 6 boroughs of Toronto, a good portion could've taken that. We should've had alternative lines. It's too heavily reliant on Lines 1 and 2.
Yep, some redundancy would definitely take strain away from certain lines and give some flexibility if you have to re-route. That's something I did like about NYC and other similar transit networks. I still can't believe it's taken the Crosstown this long to get going. I was in highschool when it started and now I'm in my 30s lol. I have no confidence in them building any new infrastructure in a timely fashion.
The crosstown lessons are being learned, the Ontario Line will have a simpler contract structure so a lot of the foolery that happened with Line 5 is unlikely to happen with the Ontario Line. Thats without getting into a plethora of other issues that Line 5 has had to deal with. I get the frustration, but they're learning - albeit a little slowly.
Same, was in high school when they started, I was so excited because I live right near Eglinton. Now I'm 30, and it's still not finished.
bloor line is down and college being torn up on the same weekend.... between the city and the transit commission I'm not sure which one less adept at thinking things through
It's the lesser of many evils unfortunately. Less traffic on the weekends so that's the best time to do it with the least amount of disruptions. Not having redundancies definitely hurts them in this regard. Once any part of the subway line is down it's chaos.
Yeah, this is shockingly slow. By comparison, my home city added 17 metro stations since 2020, and 45 stations between 2010 and 2020.
“We don’t send out shuttle busses until 30 minutes after a delay just to be sure there is a delay” Legit word for word what a TTC worker told me when a station lost power a few weeks ago “We know the problem, we don’t know how long it will take to fix, so to be sure we wait 30 minutes before we call for them” When they did call for them, at this point you have several school trips going on, massive crowds of people unsure of where to go, and the entire station looks like a concert with how many people. TTC infrastructure is absolute trash.
Brutal. I'm lucky I can bike most times to work. The few times I can't, I try for streetcars and my last resort is subway for this reason.
Part of the problem is they don’t have many buses just hanging around on standby for this. They have to pull them out of service from other lines and bring them over.
Or hop on a bike if you are able and make use of the bike lanes.
not sure if you know but in Toronto one doesn't need a bike to use the bike lane, just an inflated sense of entitlement and with that one can use their car or go jogging with their dog
I know what you mean. Why do some people so entitled? I see bikes on sidewalks all the time. I’ve even seen bikes going the wrong way in narrow bike lanes. Maybe they wanted to avoid the sidewalks.
> I see bikes on sidewalks all the time. I’ve even seen bikes going the wrong way in narrow bike lanes. It's more than likely Uber Eats delivery workers. They'll do whatever 'shortcut' it takes to get to their delivery faster.
ya, i don't move for either. i definitely don't move for the ebikes on the sidewalk, i will legit post right in their path. or feign a clothesline it's usually the same type going the wrong way in the bike lane as well like i said.... all that's needed is an inflated sense of entitlement and the Toronto public spaces can be your playground.
On a bus now. Crazy to see the amount of delivery service on bloor clogging up the road.
I had a great time going from Woodbine to Runnymede and back again with my children… Not.
Had the exact same thought. At minimum St George to Yonge-Bloor. Was faster to walk!
Danforth should automatically convert to a BRT any time the subway shuts down. All cars can take the ‘side streets’ we hear so much about whenever a bike lane is proposed. Drivers are only 8% of people moving through the Corridor, to give you a sense of the baked-in privilege.
They should eliminate parking on Danforth for that time and make the parking spots BRT and have a hive of parking cops around to ensure no one parks 'just for a sec'. I live on an E/W street very close to Danforth and lots of kids play on the streets around here and I just know people would drive like absolute morons if they were forced to rat-run through the nearby neighbourhoods.
Surely drivers already do that when the subway breaks down? A certain proportion of people must go to their Google Maps? And yes, a scheme to stop rat-running and shove drivers onto Dundas or O’Connor should be twinned with that. Unfortunately with the Complete Streets eliminating parking doesn’t provide a straight shot over a whole bunch of stretches. Parking tends to be in bays. However, it would allow for more freedom of movement of buses - and for passage of emergency vehicles. But yah, this is all rehearsal for a future where the Bloor Danforth line is overloaded and we need BRT anyways!
Do you have a source on that 8% figure? I'd love to read more about it
Toronto.ca/DanforthStudy - it’s one of the pie charts - saw it at a public display consultation as well - did a double-take. ‘You mean THAT is the source of all the barking?’
Love that idea!
If the police wouldn't enforce it whats the point of making it car only.
Red light cameras could totally enforce a no rights/no lefts on cross streets. Needs provincial legislation thought
Not a crazy thought at all but unfortunately clown politicians won’t turn kensington or yonge-dundas area car-free so there’s no way they’d stop car traffic on a strech of road across the city :/
So they are shutting down the subway line again next weekend, https://www.ttc.ca/service-advisories/subway-service/2-Line-2-Bloor-Danforth-Woodbine-to-Kennedy-full-weekend-closure-April-20-and-21 Do we uhm, wanna maybe go set up some barricades?
That’s a great idea but would NEVER happen in this shithole if a city.
With the lack of parking and bike lanes that is not a bad idea. However you would have to contend with lots of one way streets that meet head on at Bloor.
I always assumed car free means roads are open to pedestrian, meaning no buses or any other vehicles either
It's not always black and white when it comes to defining car-free. Some car-free streets have transit like in the Netherlands. Some have just pedestrians. Some allow both pedestrians and cyclists. At the end of the day, car-free most likely means free of single occupant private vehicles.
For Ottawa city center and downtown Toronto I'd say a single passenger free set of streets would make sense, cyclists in their own defined area is fine too, but any motorized vehicles (busses, taxi or any other Muti person) means you need to waste all the space anyways and seemingly defeats the purpose
That would actually make so much sense
This is the exact reason I drive my car. So much wasted potential in this city. If we had proper dedicated lanes for transit I would sell my car so fast
Maybe they should fix the subway we have so that it doesn’t need to be constantly shut down before they start building new ones.
It’s a backup for predictable off-line time. Why would you not? Drivers are only 8% of volume.
That 8% makes up a lot of picks ups and deliveries for the business that line that street
No it doesnt
My professional success requires me to know that they are but ok. i remain financially comfortable in an industry and a city where few are, but i guess that was the result of luck and not bookkeeping. Ill go let the rest of the food and bev businesses on the street know.
Expansive infrastructure will always require some repairs to stay operational, and having more subways would make shutting down Bloor-Danforth for repairs far less of an inconvenience. If Eglinton was up and running then people needing to head east or west across the city would have an easy alternative option.
Isn’t this because they ARE fixing the subway?
They’re always “fixing” the subway. It seems as if parts of it are shut down every week. It didn’t use to be this way.
I can't agree with you more.
Agree 100% on that statement, but that would be too efficient, and this is Toronto after all, efficiency does not show up in the planners vernacularity.
It’s not as easy as that on a temporary basis.
Would it be possible to turn 1 lane into a temporary bus only lane?
There only is one lane
Of course, my bad
Both directions share!
Now that's just out of control lol
There is also the possibility of taking that parking away and turning into a bus lane temporarily, but I don’t think all of Bloor Danforth has a parking lane in all parts.
Probably too messy, I misremembered how that layout is now.
I live by Vic Park and Danforth, and I know there’s no parking on the south side by Shoppers World (presumably due to the fact that Shoppers World is really a suburban plaza). More so, I tend to agree with OP, but I can’t see that happening in a city with a big car addiction unfortunately.
We do have plans to do this on streets like dufferin full time, we will make progress
Hopefully!! Based on what I hear about how bad that bus is, dedicated bus lanes are long overdue. Really, all arterials in Toronto should have RapidTO lanes, ESPECIALLY the 3 lane stroads!
This literally makes no sense. You think the solution to a temporary transit removal is to ban cars along the busiest street in the city?
Question is why can't the workers who are fixing the subway do it off hours when the subways aren't running. Why must they have to inconvenience everyone who uses the subway, especially this long of a stretch of stops. Taking the shuttle bus is a pain and it delays everything , since it doesn't hold the same amount of volume of passengers.
If you owned and ran a business on Danforth, you'd be pissed if no one could drive to your place of business
I remember reading an article that asked business owners on Bloor what percentage of their customers drove to their businesses. The owners answered in the range of 25%, when it was actually 4%.
Probably considering that 95% of the customers to those business either live in the area or get their by transit, I wouldn’t be that fuzzed. Also…Danforth itself has very limited parking available, people that drive to those businesses probably drive to those side streets to park. Which they can still get to if the Danforth was closed to car traffic.
A single car of customers vs a bus load of customers... gee if they're that terrible at math, they shouldn't run a business.
The average storefront fits one parked car. That is one customer at a time. Great business decision.
Zero customers actually since the spot in front of the store is taken by the owner. What they're arguing for here personal convenience, even to the detriment of their business.
They always are, and studies show that business owners always overestimate how many of their customers drive to them. There's plenty of parallel routes and parking for those who'd prefer it.
Countless studies have shown that restricting streets to cars increases customer traffic and sales for businesses. I agree it's counterintuitive, but these business owners should know better.
It’s fascinating how all these businesses in highly populated areas surrounded by mass transit live and die based on if one person can park in front of their store for 2 hours I guess why bother catering to the thousands of people living near you when you depend on one person driving in from Innisfil to spend $10
People went to stores for thousands of years without a car. Believe it or not, they still do.
Okay. Whatever you say, Mr. Al Carbone, owner/ operator of Kitkat restaurant.
Not anymore, it closed down.
Sorry, former owner
Sad news for you. Bike lanes are actually better for a business than we think. This post isn't about bike lanes but the concept of increasing non-car trips helps businesses. https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2021-12-08/for-store-owners-bike-lanes-boost-the-bottom-line
Ass hats block off bike lane every 5 mins or so
You're missing the point. I'm just saying that foot/bike traffic is more beneficial to a business than car traffic.
Oh no, anyways
Get rid of the bike lanes.
You mean on-street parking?
Fucking this, as someone who lives in the danforth that seldom used bike lane has caused fucking nothing but problems
No that would make too much sense.
How much more money we need to throw in the subway system that does not work. Have you guys ever taken the subway system in Paris in Italy in New York and Japan in China in Sydney? Australia in Albania? Let alone here in Canada time unbelievable how awkward everything is?
See people need to go places, and most people drive, so that would never happen cause it’s just not smart
Haha op got inconvenienced and wants Toronto to cater to them. Typical Reddit post. Hey maybe get a car if it’s such an issue. If not then put your headphones in and shut the fuck up like the rest of us living in the largest city in the country.
welcome to the joy of bike lanes. i'm willing to bet 10s of people will use them this weekend, so worth it.
welcome to the joy of on-street parking. i'm willing to bet 10s of people will use them this weekend, so worth it.
It’s honestly mind boggling that how spatially unaware you are.
You're 100% correct as someone who lives and works on the danforth that fucking bike lane they put in has caused nothing but problems and there is someone going by using it as intended once ever...what 10 min..if that
Our streets have been car free for significant stretches since October 8, 2023. Unfortunately, your bus can’t access them either
Blame the bike lanes
Blame the on-street parking
On street parking has always been there and was never an issue. It's the bike lanes. I remember a drive from VP to Donalds only took 8 minutes. Now it's nearly 20
Look at 7 Bathurst bus going north of the station. No bike lanes. Just on-street parking. It's always a slow congested area. You really underestimate just how severely bad on-street parking is. You have drivers that are pulling in and out which severely slow down traffic. You have buses that need to pass parked cars. You also have people getting in and out of their cars that don't look for traffic on their left. The only reason you think it's never an issue is because the issues that on-street parking poses is like white noise. Given that bike lanes are new to the society, it's no surprise we'd be looking for ways to blame on it. If on-street parking was implemented today, same thing.
Just finished walking along the street and just hoping that the subway will be operational the next two weekends when i'm planning to use it. Feel bad for those who dont have other options other than adding 45 mins to their commute. Danforth as it is currently designed doesnt work at the best of times, so throw in a subway closure or construction on a nearby street and it becones a disaster for everyone but cyclists. Truthfully the car free option for this weekend might have made the most sense as the temporary closure last Sunday for the parade probablyh caused less of a disruption than this week....but again that was for 3-4 hrs.
So the ttc is a disorganized mess, and the entire city should shut down to accomodate them? Im sorry if you have to ride the ttc, andnim sorry for everyone else on it. Still no one else needs to suffer aside from those unfortunates.
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I love that you are accusing the dude riding the bus of having main character syndrome, the irony is palpable.
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