David Shellnutt, a lawyer specialising in cycling-injury cases, leads a protest calling for safer streets in Toronto, Canada, on May 30. Cyclists in Toronto are resisting a law that would have the city rip out kilometres of bike lanes, setting back efforts towards safer streets. Photo / Ian Willms, the New York Times
David Shellnutt, a lawyer specialising in cycling-injury cases, leads a protest calling for safer streets in Toronto, Canada, on May 30. Cyclists in Toronto are resisting a law that would have the city rip out kilometres of bike lanes, setting back efforts towards safer streets. Photo / Ian Willms, the New York Times
After years of close calls with unruly drivers, streets with no bike lanes and tending to friends injured in collisions, Melanie Ng was optimistic that cycling in Toronto was getting easier.
Toronto’s bike lanes had undergone a significant growth spurt since the pandemic, carving out safer spaces for cyclists.
“Thecity was finally making strides,” Ng, a doctoral student in history, said after cycling onto the leafy downtown campus of the University of Toronto.
Then came the backlash.
Some of the most popular bike lanes were making Toronto’s notorious traffic worse, according to the provincial government.
So, Doug Ford, Premier of Toronto’s province, Ontario, passed a law to rip out 14 miles (22.5km) of the lanes from three major streets that serve the core of the city.
Toronto Mayor Olivia Chow arrived for her first day in office two years ago riding a bike.
She was not pleased with the law, arguing that the city had sole discretion to decide street rules.
Chow did not respond to a request to comment. But in public remarks, she has since softened her tone, suggesting it was possible to have a “win-win solution” by relocating some bike lanes or keeping them in place while adding more driving lanes.
“We could design them better,” Chow told reporters in April.
Bike lanes are a sore point for many drivers frustrated by the constant traffic jams in the heart of Toronto.
“There’s so much traffic because of bike lanes,” said Nasser Moradman, who has driven a taxi in Toronto for 30 years.
The lanes aren’t even used much during the long winter, he complained, adding: “It’s miserable. It’s very tough to drive in the city.”
Cycling proponents and others who vehemently oppose Ford’s move mounted a legal challenge, and a provincial court has temporarily barred the removal of any bike lanes until a judge decides if the new law is unconstitutional.
Cities across the world, including New York and Paris, have added kilometres of bike lanes to make streets safer for cyclists and encourage drivers to abandon their vehicles and opt for more climate-friendly modes of travel, such as cycling and public transportation.
In some places, the lanes have also set off criticism from drivers and others who say that they have made life worse for people who have to drive, including delivery workers and taxi drivers.
Sharon Danley who opposes Toronto's bike lanes. Photo / Ian Willms, the New York Times
United States President Donald Trump called New York’s bike lanes dangerous and claimed that cyclists were “whacking people”.
In Canada, government data shows that about an average of two million people commute to Toronto by car on workdays.
And those commuters contribute to the city’s congestion, which ranks second behind Vancouver among Canadian cities, according to TomTom, a global traffic index.
Toronto’s chronic traffic snarls can come as an unwelcome surprise to some visitors.
In February, the Carolina Hurricanes hockey team had to abandon a ride because of traffic and walk the remaining blocks to a downtown arena — not the first time that professional athletes have had to do that.
The problems have cost the Toronto region about CA$45 billion ($54.6b) in lost productivity per year, according to a report by the Canadian Centre for Economic Analysis.
“Congestion has reached crisis levels,” said Giles Gherson, president of the Toronto Board of Trade, which suggested in a report that Toronto “rebalance” its roads by cutting back street-level parking and moving bike lanes.
Many commuters also argue that driving into Toronto from the suburbs is often faster than using public transportation, with experts saying that the city lacks enough rapid transit to meet its needs.
The provincial government has been criticised for long delays to transit projects.
The province says only 1.2% of workers commute by bike. For comparison, even in New York City, which has a large system of bike lanes, about 1.4% of people commute by bike, according to city figures.
The conflict in Toronto has resonated with people such as Sharon Danley, a retiree.
She recently joined a citizens group opposing a bike lane on her street, which she said was disruptive and unfair. The lane, she said, slows down a transit bus for people with disabilities.
“Now what we’re doing is clogging up lean arteries and causing a lot of harm,” Danley said.
In Toronto, where the car has long been king, cyclists have been gaining ground.
Toronto added 67 miles (110km) of bike lanes between 2020 and 2024 and now has 207 miles (333km) of them. The city’s bike-share service had 6.9 million rides in 2024, up from 2.9 million in 2020.
“Cycling has become more pleasant,” said Chad Mohr, a food-bank volunteer who delivers groceries by bike.
“Now they’re talking about ripping tonnes of that infrastructure out, which would be a tragedy and just a giant, ridiculous, expensive step backward.”
The city spent about CA$27 million ($32.7m) to install the bike lanes that Ontario now wants to eliminate. In a report, it estimates that removing them would cost CA$48m.
A ghost bike memorial to a cyclist killed in a traffic collision in Toronto, Canada. Photo / Ian Willms, the New York Times
Last year, Toronto said halfa dozen cyclists were killed in the city, the highest number in two decades. Between 2016 and 2023, 260 cyclists have been seriously injured, with most crashes on streets with no bike lanes.
Removing bike lanes would “cost people their lives”, said Geoffrey Bercarich, a bike-repair technician who installs memorials called ghost bikes in places where cyclists have been killed.
Ford has made it clear that he is not opposed to cyclists or cycling.
“I’m not against bike lanes,” he told reporters in May. “Build all the bike lanes you want, just not on main arterial roads.”
Cycling proponents argue that the province has not shown any evidence that removing bike lanes will ease traffic.
“This idea that they’re somehow the cause of Toronto’s traffic woes isn’t based on any fact,” said Michael Longfield, executive director of Cycle Toronto, an advocacy group.
He was speaking by phone from a hospital, where he was recovering from a fractured leg that he said he sustained while cycling when a driver opened a door into a bike lane.
The Ontario Government has passed a measure that would protect it from lawsuits by cyclists injured on roads where the province tears out bike lanes.
Cycling supporters say the move amounts to a tacit acknowledgment that riders will be hurt if the province is allowed to eliminate bike lanes, said David Shellnutt, a personal-injury lawyer in Toronto specialising in cycling cases.
“It is an admission that, yes, we know that what we’re proposing here will result in injury and death,” Shellnutt said, “and so we’re going to insulate ourselves from accountability.”
