ActiveTO Initiatives are making sure people have space to get around while respecting physical distancing. This program is closing major roads for active transportation and adding bike lanes around the Greater Toronto Area. One of the projects was adding bike lanes on Brimley Road between Lawrence Avenue East and Kingston Road. Toronto spent $160,000 installing the bike lanes in July.
On November 30, the city of Toronto announced that the Brimley bike lanes will be removed immediately. Sadly, the city spent about $80,000 by just removing the bicycle paths. A total of $240,000 spent on adding and then removing these bike lanes in Brimley. Marvin Macaraig, the coordinator of Scarborough Cycles, was unhappy about the removal of the bike lanes. “We’ve seen this kind of bait-and-switch game happen before,” he told Toronto Star newspaper.
With the country’s deficit projected to nearly $400 billion by the end of the year to help Canadians through the pandemic, the city of Toronto is not helping the cause.