Monday, June 15, 2020

Alternative Route Suggestions for Proposed Bike Lanes on Brimley Rd.




Thomson Park to Bluffers Park

One of the rationales put forward for taking two lanes out of Brimley is to allow a cyclist to travel between Thomson Park and Buffers Park.

We’re not too sure how many people would actually make that trip, even on a nice sunny dry day, but there is an attractive alternative route which does NOT put cyclists on busy arterial roads, nor does it cross hundreds of residential driveways, not does it take lanes away from heavy industry south of Danforth Road.

Below is an air photo of central Scarborough from Ellesmere down to the Lake Ontario shoreline.

In orange are existing multi-purpose paths separated from arterial road traffic. In red are the Brimorton bike lanes painted on the roadway.

The orange paths in the air photo run through the following parks and ravines:

  • The Gatineau-Meadowway-Pan Am path systems;
  • Birkdale Ravine;
  • Thomson Park;
  • The Highland Creek ravine system;
  • The small branch of the Highland Creek that connects Knob Hill Park on the east side of Brimley with McCowan Park; and
  • The 2 km diagonal path system south of Eglinton between the Bellamy GO Station and Brimley Road. It runs in the former Scarborough Expressway lands. I don’t know if it has a name so I’ll call it the Expressway Path.

To connect these with safe walking-cycling paths, there are two ‘missing links’.

  1. About 0.75 km through Hague park; and
  2. About 1.1 km south down McCowan Road from McCowan Park to the Expressway Path; ...which takes you back to Brimley south of the heavy industries.

We leave it to Councillor Crawford and his communities to decide if they want to continue a painted bike lane system on Brimley or McCowan south from the Expressway Path

McCowan Road from McCowan Park to EglintonIt’s a dead end. It operates as a local street carrying very little traffic compared to an arterial like Brimley.
No TTC buses operate on this part of McCowan.
There are only 2 homes with driveway to this part of McCowan.
It is paved today as a two-lane street but the City owns a 27m wide right of way. There should be lots of room to build a separate cycle track down to Eglinton.
McCowan south from Eglinton
It’s four lanes and in my experience, this part of McCowan is not heavily travelled. If there is no feasible way to build a bike path separate from the travelled lanes under the CNR-GO line here, the impact on traffic of taking two lanes should be far less than taking two lanes out of 4 kilometres of Brimley.

The Bellamy 9 TTC bus runs on McCowan south of Eglinton. The latest data available to us shows that this bus carries less than half the passengers that ride the Brimley 21 bus every day.

If you believe a lot of people want to ride bicycles down and back up the severe slope of Brimley below Kingston Road and you think that slope is safe for all ages/stages of cyclists, then proceed with that part of your plan.

Advantages of our Hague Park-McCowan Road proposal:

  1. Builds on/ connects to the existing Highland Creek and Expressway path system;
  2. Displaces very little traffic from busy arterial roads;
  3. Does not interfere with busy TTC bus routes;
  4. No conflict with heavy truck traffic from industrial operations;
  5. Crosses 2 residential driveways from Thomson Park south to McCowan District Park and back to Brimley south of Skagway.
  6. Puts more people on the Expressway path which increases safety for everyone.
  7. Connects to McCowan District Park:

  • Scarborough’s only outdoor skating trail
  • Scarborough’s second outdoor skating rink
  • Sports fields
  • Splash pads
  • Children’s play areas
  • Picnic areas





Below is how it lays out. Red lines are existing bike lanes painted on roads. Orange lines are existing pedestrian-cycle paths in Scarborough parks and ravines.



Lorne Ross for Glen Andrew Community Association

Brimley Bike Lanes (Three Parts)



Getting Around Central Scarborough for the Next Three Years
Retaining Industrial Jobs and Taxes 
Cycling & Pedestrian Data 

Dear Councillor Thompson:

Please take the time to read through the three parts of this response to your proposed Brimley bike lanes.

PART ONE: Getting Around Central Scarborough for the Next Three Years 

Perhaps staff told you it would be just fine to hand over two lanes of Brimley to non-existent bicycles because all the traffic will just go “somewhere else”.

Or maybe they don’t care… putting obstacles in the way of drivers is a ‘good’ thing…because every obstacle will force Scarborough people to walk, get their bike out of the garage, or wait for the bus to make their 5 or 6 trips every day to work, the daycare centre, shopping, T-ball practise, music lessons, medical appointments etc.

Perhaps the bike lobby isn’t aware of how many lane closures and diversion and outright road closures are on the books for people trying to get around central Scarborough.

If they don’t know, you do. Here’s a shortlist of what we are facing in our part of the city for the next 3 or 4 or if the past is any example maybe 5 years:

  1. Lawrence Avenue- McCowan Road lane closures, lane diversions, millions of heavy vehicle deliveries of construction material for 3 to 5 years to build a subway station 35 m deep in the ground using ‘cut and cover’ construction;
  2. McCowan Road from Bushby drive to Progress through our Scarborough Centre: 3 to 5 years of lane closures and diversion to build a subway station 30 m deep in the ground in a high water table area using ‘cut and cover’ construction: millions of heavy vehicles trips delivering material;
  3. Progress Avenue closed at the Stouffville GO tracks for 2 or 3 years to build an overpass; thousands of heavy vehicle trips to deliver materials and equipment;
  4. Danforth Road closed west of Midland for 3 or 4 years to build an underpass under the Stouffville GO tracks; thousands of heavy vehicle trips to deliver materials and equipment;
  5. Eglinton from Kennedy to Kingston Road, which already has Diamond Lanes for buses in rush hours, hands over the curb lanes for ‘buses only’ all day;
  6. Ellesmere from McCowan to Morningside hands over the two centre lanes for Durham buses and the curb lanes for non-existent bikes.
  7. Eglinton west of Midland closed for ?? years to excavate a trench to remove the subway tunnel boring machine, connect the tunnel into Kennedy Station; thousands of heavy vehicles delivering material.




So where is the magical “somewhere else” that Brimley traffic is supposed to go when you take out 2 lanes for bikes?

PART TWO: Retaining Industrial Jobs and Taxes
You’ve been a major champion of retaining Scarborough’s industrial employment throughout your career. It’s not in your Ward but you are Deputy Mayor for Scarborough and we have 33 hectares of Industrial activity on both sides of Brimley south of Danforth Road.

Heavy industries like Crupi Paving, Atlantic Packaging and Praxair. Probably the largest trucking warehouse in Scarborough, +\- 40,000 m2, is on the west side Dozens more are down there on lower Brimley Road and on Skagway trying to employ your residents, pay taxes to Toronto.

All of these put trucks, tractor-trailers, bulk carriers, heavy dump trucks on lower Brimley where you want to put bike lanes.




Do you have a report from your Economic Development staff supporting these bike lanes?
I know you’ve seen these heavy vehicles on Scarborough Streets, but in case the bike lobby folks don’t know how Scarborough works, below are examples of the heavy trucks these industries put on Brimley Road up to Danforth Road every day. 




PART THREE: CYCLING & PEDESTRIAN DATA

We’ve been out counting cyclists and pedestrians on the Gatineau path and the painted cycle lanes on Brimorton, Conlins and Sheppard. The data is startling:


  • 10 3/4 hours spent on Brimorton = 13 people in the bike lanes; 302 walking on the sidewalks
  • 3 hours on Conlins = 7 people using the bike lanes; 17 people walking on the sidewalks.
  • 2 1/2 hours on Sheppard = 8 people using the bike lanes; 53 people walking on the sidewalks.
Grand total on the painted roadside bike lanes:

  • 8.35 kilometres of painted bikeways
  • 16 ¼ hours monitoring
  • 28 cyclists
Funny story: A couple of days ago I spent an hour counting bikes on Brimorton. I only needed one finger. When I got home I counted one coyote trotting down the sidewalk in front of my home.



When the number of coyotes equals the number of cyclists you know you’ve wasted your time and money painting bike lanes like on Brimorton.

Glen Andrew supports building safe recreational bike paths in our parks and open spaces. The Gatineau path is a huge success! We put in 3 hours of monitoring and counted 123 cyclists and 91 pedestrians.

The speed of cyclists on the very popular Gatineau path is almost dangerous to kids learning to ride, old-timers like me and family groups out walking on this super popular recreational path.

If you have $40,000.00 to spend to promote cycling in Scarborough, spend it where it may do some good.

HERE ARE SOME IDEAS:

  • Expand the Gatineau path so cyclists have their own lanes and do not endanger people walking, jogging, pushing baby strollers, little kids learning to ride, people carrying supplies and tools to their allotment gardens;
  • Speed up restoring the pedestrian-bicycles paths in our Highland Creek system which seems to take two and three years to repair after washouts;
  • Design-build a way to get the Gatineau path over/under the Stouffville GO line between Kennedy and Midland to unite the two parts of the system!
Lorne Ross for the Glen Andrew Community Association.

Wednesday, June 3, 2020

Letter to Councillor Thompson - Bike Lanes on Brimley Rd.


Councillor Michael Thompson
RE: Impact of Bike Lanes on Brimley Road

Dear Councillor Thompson:

We are truly disappointed that you and Mayor Tory did not pause to think about the impact of taking two lanes away from Brimley Road and handing them over to the bicycle lobby.

If you had paused to think about the impact on just one neighbourhood you would never have supported this disastrous proposal. Please take a look at the impact on just one neighbourhood on the west side of Brimley from Lawrence south to the creek just north of Ferndale Baptist Church.

It’s about 42 hectares [105 acres] in size. Your Planning Staff have all the numbers but I’m going to suggest there are about 400 homes in this neighbourhood.

Brimley Road is their only access out to the rest of the city. There are no streets connecting them to Lawrence nor to Midland. Brimley is it.


With all the best intentions of good city planning in the 1960’s the streets connecting this neighborhood to Brimley were deliberately NOT lined up with streets connecting to Brimley from the neighbourhood on the east side.

There are two traffic lights allowing people from this neighbourhood to get out safely onto Brimley road when it’s busy.

1. Shediac was realigned to line up with Fraserton on the east side a few years back and a signal installed.


2. Deerfield has a signal. But Seminole on the east side was too far south to bring it into the signal. People are encouraged by signs not to block Seminole when they are stopped at thelights.

None of the other streets connecting to Brimley are signalized. If you use Haileybury, Arnprior, Canzone, and Gully Drive you have to wait for a gap or depend on the courtesy of Brimley drivers.

55 homes in this one neighbourhood front onto the west side of Brimley: their driveways cross the sidewalk and connect right into the curb lane…. the lane you want to convert to a bikeway.

Same thing for the Scarborough Centre Alliance Church and the +\-25 recently built townhouses up close to Lawrence.

Your people have the traffic counts. The best one we have is from the Brimley Ellesmere development project. It counted 1,900 vehicles on Brimley in the busiest hour in the morning and another 2,100 vehicles on Brimley in the busiest hour in the afternoon. We know ‘rush hour’ is actually 3 hours long in the afternoon and maybe 2 hours in the morning.

You force all these vehicles into the one remaining lane, and throw away left and right hand turn lanes at intersections and there won’t be many ‘gaps’ for people to get out of their neighbourhood on Haileybury, Arnprior, Canzone, and Gully Drive.

TTC ‘route planner’ tell us they run 150 buses up and down Brimley Road every 24 hours. That’s how transit riders from this neighbourhood connect to Kennedy Subway Station gong south. That’s how they get to all the other bus routes that come together at Scarborough Centre Station. The Brimley bus carried over 9,500 passengers on a typical weekday as of 2014.

If you shut down one lane each direction and force all traffic into the centre lanes, a single vehicle stopped to make a left turn, or even a right hand turn across the bikeway, and a single bus stopped to take on/let off passengers, will block everyone else in the one remaining lane. How ‘courteous’ will they be about letting people get out to Brimley from the church, the townhouses or Haileybury, Arnprior, Canzone, and Gully Drive

You need to tell those 55 homeowners who front onto Brimley just exactly how you expect them to get in/out of their homes. First across the sidewalk, then across your bikeway, then backing into the one lane you have left for them which will be full of frustrated drivers.

Sorry Mike: you’ve been sold a bill of goods by the bicycle lobby.

This has nothing to do with helping people cooped up for the past 6 weeks to get out there and enjoy the sunshine, get some exercise. If there were truly pent up demand by thousands of folks just itching to get their bikes out for some exercise, we’d be seeing crowds on the bikeways we already have. Instead we continue to see practically no-one on the 4 kilometer bike path painted on Brimorton ten years ago.

Lastly just how safe will anybody enjoying this new bikeway be with thousands of disgruntled drivers queued up in the one remaining lane, bus passengers walking across their path and homeowners tying to get in/out of their driveways.

That’s just one neighbourhood. Identical issues are going to come at you from all along Brimley Road.

As we read the Council decision, it looks like the local Councillor has authority to think again and cancel this plan:

5. City Council direct the General Manager, Transportation Services to, as part of the design, installation, and monitoring process, work in consultation with the local Councillors and stakeholders to identify and implement changes to the ActiveTO cycling projects as may be necessary to address operational and safety issues as they may arise, including modification or removal of the ActiveTO cycling projects if deemed necessary.

We strongly suggest you use this authority to stop this before it gets started.

Lorne Ross

For the Glen Andrew Community Association