The provincial government that routinely requires Ottawa to remain in its jurisdictional lane is eager to deviate to the lanes of another jurisdiction.
Bicycle lanes.
The transport minister, Devin Dreehen, has indicated that he wants cities, particularly Edmonton and Calgary, alter or eliminate any cycling lane that prevent car traffic, and avoid future bicycles for bicycles that do it. If they do not, Alberta could create the powers to do so.
Alberta would not be the first province to insert itself in the bike lane debate, following other conservative politicians in Ontario And, more recently, New Scotland. If it is called to finish the “War against cars“Or fighting for”common sense“The fight on which road users obtain asphalt space have sounded similar throughout the country.
But there are lessons in a new judicial ruling that annulled the attempted of the largest province to start bicycle lanes in Toronto, beyond the constitutional violations cited by the judge.
Ontario launched his plan to dismantle Toronto bicycle lane barriers, repeatedly stating that they worsen the congestion of the vehicle by compromising the vehicle space. It is the same logic that Dreeshen was applied last monthBefore your meeting on the subject with the mayor of Calgary, Jyoti Gondek: “While we finance the main infrastructure projects, such as Deerfoot [Trail]To improve traffic flow and reduce congestion, some local decisions move in the opposite direction, eliminating driving lanes. “
The challenge of the Cycle Toronto court of the “reduction in the Ontario stagnation, saving its time law” caused the courts to retreat the council and the investigation that supported Ontario’s claims against the bicycle lanes. Or, mainly, her lack.
“On the contrary, the records produced by the Government in this litigation show that the internal council before approved Bill 212 was that protected bicycle lanes can have a positive impact on congestion and that eliminating them would do little, in any case, to relieve the block of the network, and can worsen the congestion.” Ontario Judge Paul Schabas Declaration states.
An Ontario court ruled against the Ford government plan to eliminate bicycle lanes along three main streets of Toronto. Tyler Cheese of CBC has a reaction of those on both sides of the debate.
The decision refers to an engineering firm that the province hired to study its cars lane restoration. He informed: “By removing bicycle lanes and replacing them with traffic lanes, it can increase the capacity of the vehicle along the immediate length of the road, the real relief of the congestion can be insignificant or short -lived due to other confusion factors or induced demand.”
The induced demand refers to a well -traveled concept in transport engineering that expanding road capacity will attract more cars and, therefore, will restore any congestion that is briefly eliminated.
(Meanwhile, Schabas also found that the risks of health and safety for cyclists if they lost their routes protected by the barrier through key parts of the Toronto center were easily tested).
Would the increase and flow in vehicle trafficking behave differently if the protective curbs for the safest cycling were eliminated in favor of an additional driving lane at 12th Avenue S. or Fifth Street SW in Calgary?
Dreeshen left his July 30 meeting with the mayor of Calgary, Jyoti Gondek, pleased that she agreed with her interest in eliminating the problematic bicycle problems.
“These bicycle lanes are not fixed,” journalists told journalists. “If a bicycle lane is causing any concern about congestion or parking, our traffic equipment is open to review and make the necessary changes.”
The question, then, could see if Calgary and Alberta could find a problem that Toronto and Ontario did not do.
In 2015, the city added its network in the center of protected bicycles of temporary barrier in some streets, such as a pilot project.
The city officials measured the change in the travel times of motorists along with bicycle security bollards. Throughout a stretch of eight blocks from the eighth SW avenue, there was no change in west traffic during the afternoon peak, and a 15 -second decrease that goes to the opposite way in the morning, according to a 2016 city report.
What impact did the Fifth Street cycle lanes have for their 14 blocks? In the afternoon, trips increased in 10 seconds.
The morning travel times increased in 90 seconds along the section of the center of 12th Avenue S., including 13 additional seconds of delay in the intersection of two new bicycle lanes, but the officials in that report promised to check the signal time and the design of the road before the lane becomes permanent.
Would these numbers justify the elimination of bicycle lanes, which had not persuaded the Council to do so at that time? And what compensation are acceptable to create a safe route for cyclists around the city center?
The city also measures the number of cyclists (and other users) that go up and pass through Calgary’s business core. In that sense, statistics show little change of before and after, despite the great hopes of the promoters of a great boost to cyclists numbers.
In 2014, before protected bicycle lanes, the proportion of center travelers who entered or left two wheels was 1.7 percent. The rates increased before the pandemic to 2.7 percent in 2017, that still seems insensitive to relative numbers, but that is more than 50 percent jump on bicycle trips.
However, he dropped to 1.9 percent in the 2024 transport count.
Dreehen commented on that figure after his meeting with Gondek. “That means that 98 percent of people travel daily in their vehicles, “he told CBC Radio’s The house’s house.
“And obviously, when you take away a driving lane for vehicles to put a bicycle lane, you are helping that little two percent of travelers at the expense of drivers.”
Dreeshen is incorrect that there are two versus 98 percent, since the total non -cycle also includes traffic users and people entering the city center; Automobile drivers and passengers represent 59 percent of visits to the center, according to Statistics of the city.
And there is another statistic that Gondek stood out after seeing the minister: less than one percent of the Calgary road surface is dedicated to bicycles.
This will certainly become political fodder, reaching the municipal votes of the fall. A conservative aligned Candidate for mayor of Edmonton He is echoing the provincial rhetoric with the promise of stopping the new bicycle lanes, and Calgary Coun. Dan McLean He said He wants the Route of the Eighth Avenue eliminated and others reviewed.
Meanwhile, the UCP issued a letter to the members this week in the name of Dreeshen, urging them to evaluate the question of a party survey about a possible repression of bicycle lanes, along with other questions that invite supporters to support the existing policies of UCP on taxes, content of school libraries and private surgery clinics.
“Of course, not everyone lives in the center. But many of us travel to the city for work, errands or events, and we also feel the impact,” said the email of the Dreeshen party.
This rhetoric reaches the heart of why provincial conservatives like to make hay about curbs and lane paint in the nucleus of a city, where voters tend to bias to NDP or liberal. His own suburban and small town would probably be annoyed by the space on the road where they cannot drive or park, especially on a busy game or a lunch hour when they venture in the center.
Just as Route planning For the green line, LRT is supposed to be the jurisdiction of the city, so is the addition and subtraction of bicycle lanes, although at least with the LRT, the Smith government can argue that they are a financing partner.
The great interest of the Smith government in the bicycle barriers of the center comes along with the comments of the Minister of Municipal Affairs, Dan Williams, this week For Postmedia, on the cities business it is a provincial business.
“Each municipality in this province, from the largest cities to the smallest summer villages, are creatures of legislation promulgated by this legislature and this government has authority over those municipalities,” he said.
Technically, this is true, as it is in Ontario and in other places. However, it is not common for the provincial ministers or the prime minister to declare this fact, given all their implications for the interventions in the decisions of the city or municipal municipalities.
“I would like to see the prime minister in his lane, and it is not a bicycle lane,” said a councilor of the city of Halifax about the threats of the Prime Minister of New Scotland, Tim Houston to take energetic measures against a proposal for cycling infrastructure that has opposed.
But what happens if a provincial government sees an urban lane like its lane?
