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Remembering (and Riding for) Jack Roper
At 8 a.m. today, a group of cyclists met at Bloor and Spadina not for the usual reason—to present a Critical Mass to the city and show strength in numbers—but instead to honour the memory of one of their own. Led by members of Advocacy for Respect for Cyclists, and joined by his friends and family, they were riding for Jack Roper, the 84-year-old cyclist who died a week ago today when he collided with a car.
The group, numbering a couple dozen riders, made their way to the site of the accident at Greenwood Avenue and Plains Road, to solemnly mark with their presence and the placement of one of ARC’s white “ghost bikes” one more site in the city where a cyclist’s life has ended, added to a list of too many others. Dave Meslin, founder of the Toronto Cylists Union, noted about the sites ARC has marked over the past 15 years: “There have been two common factors at each memorial. A) a cyclist was killed. B) There was no bike lane.”
For more details about the memorial for Roper, read Ben Spurr’s full report for NOW and Meslin’s tweets from earlier today.