Results tagged “glenndebaeremaeker”

Score one for the cycling community. After an intense and late-breaking campaign, and with a crucial assist from Councillor Kyle Rae, bicycle advocates have successfully introduced bike lanes into a major redevelopment plan for Jarvis Street. Yesterday afternoon the Public Works and Infrastructure Committee (PWIC) voted to remove the centre, reversible-direction lane of traffic, and use the freed-up space to install bicycle lanes in both directions from Bloor to Queen.

"To create an urban environment in all parts of the city that encourages and supports walking," states Toronto's Pedestrian Charter, the City "upholds the right of pedestrians of all ages and abilities to safe, convenient, direct and comfortable walking conditions" and also "provides and maintains infrastructure that gives pedestrians safe and convenient passage while walking along and crossing streets."

The first item on the agenda for the April 8th meeting of City Council's Public Works and Infrastructure Committee is headed "City of Toronto Receives the Canadian Motorcycle Association Government Award" [PDF]. As the agenda was released Wednesday, we considered it an April Fools' joke, in the brief moment before we remembered that bureaucrats don't have a sense of humour.

Earlier this afternoon, Torontoist was explaining to an American friend the quirks of the process by which Torontonians are supposed to dispose of our coffee cups: pop the plastic lid off the paper cup and throw them both into the recycling bin—but don't chuck the entire contraption while the two pieces are attached, because that screws everything up. (We love public works.) The City, we said, is currently spending tens of thousands of dollars on consultants to find a way to simplify this, which ideally will result in the development of a paper lid. Yes, it might be easier to create an educational campaign touting the virtues of removing the lid, but legislating that companies produce such PSAs on their own dime would likely be an even trickier proposition. Besides, the less plastic the better. That said, it's hard to describe all this without laughing and using the words "fuckin' crazy," before finally admitting that the process the City is undertaking is actually not all that unreasonable.

Do you think you know what items go into the blue bin, what items go into the green bin, and which things go into the garbage? You don't. Even if you've studied the charts in the collection calendar, attended several meetings of the Public Works and Infrastructure Committee, read all the municipal news all the time, you don't. Sorry.

"Uh, I'm gonna hold that one up," said Councillor Bill Saundercook, raising his hand to put a hold on item 21 at last Wednesday's Public Works and Infrastructure Committee meeting. The report in question was "2008 Bikeway Network Program – Phase 5 Installation of Bicycle Lanes [PDF]," and it's likely that committee chair Glenn De Baeremaeker tensed up in the split-second before Saundercook, with perfect comic timing, dropped his punch line: "Just kidding."

When the City of Toronto issued a press release last week detailing its TTC strike contingency plans, cyclists quickly noticed that alongside the proposals for parking restrictions and pleas for employers to allow workers to use staggered schedules, "cycling" and "bikes" were mentioned exactly zero times. Spacing Toronto's Adam Chaleff-Freudenthaler reported yesterday: