August 20, 2023

August 2023 Infrastructure Roundup

Over the past few months, I have managed to do a fair number of site checks including along the Eglinton Crosstown and Finch West LRT lines, College, Wellington, and Adelaide. Given the recently completion of the Cabbagetown bikeways and more progress along the Wellington and College routes, I went by these sites this weekend and have a few more updates to pass along.

Cabbagetown Bikeways

On Friday, I took the day off to pick some apples in the east end with Not Far Fron The Tree. It’s a program in which homeowners allow volunteers to pick fruit from their trees which then gets split between the owner (if he/she wants any), the agency, and the volunteers. I first found out about this through Mikael Colville-Andersen’s “The Life Sized City” episode about Toronto. At that pick, we managed to pick 161 lbs of apples.

On my way home, I decided to check out the new Cabbagetown bikeways. Contraflow bike lanes on Sumach – the cover photo – and Sackville – photo below – have both been painted in between Gerrard and Wellesley Streets. While it would be great to extend the Sumach contraflow south to where the existing contraflow starts at Shuter Street, I was informed the stretch from Shuter to Gerrard Streets is technically not city owned and part of the Regent Park redevelopment.

West of Parliament Street, a new contraflow bike lane can be found on Winchester Street.

However, there is a block from Ontario Street to Rose Avenue where the contraflow goes between the traffic and parking lane to accommodate pick-up and drop-offs by Winchester Junior and Senior Public School. Not ideal, but understandable.

Ontario Street has a short contraflow between Aberdeen Avenue and Carlton Street, while there is an existing multi-use path north of Winchester that brings you to Wellesley Street.

Wellington Avenue

This morning, I dropped Helen off at Union Station and brought Mozzie along to check the work happening along Wellington and College on the way home.

Watermain work was still ongoing between Blue Jays Way and Clarence Square, but at least the bicycle signals were installed at Blue Jays Way. Once that work is done, the bi-directional cycle tracks will be extended here while the City’s website states a further eastern extension to Simcoe Street could happen in 2025. Now if only a further extension to Yonge could be done to eventually connect with the Esplanade-Mill bikeway …

A new cycle track has been installed on Spadina Avenue to connect with the crosswalk.

The last time I was on Wellington, the stretch west of Bathurst Street was still under construction. Fortunately, that has since been completed.

The paint hasn’t been completed along the Bathurst to Strachan stretch, but at least the barriers are there.

The bi-directional cycle track currently ends at Strachan Avenue.

However, the City’s website mentioned work just started on replacing the uni-directional cycle tracks on Douro Street (or painted bike lanes west of Shaw Street) with the bi-directional cycle track. Here is a photo of the current configuration before turning off onto Shaw Street.

College Street

When I last wrote about College Street in April, work on upgrading the bike lanes was just getting started. Since then, I can confirm the eastbound cycle tracks are completed from Manning Avenue to Bathurst Street, while only one westbound block from Euclid Street to Manning is done. You can still make out the westbound cycle track outline from Euclid to Bathurst which is waiting for some asphalt.

Most of the remaining eastbound cycle track from Bathurst Street to the T&T Supermarket just before Spadina Avenue is nearing completion and waiting for asphalt.

However, there are two blocks from Lippincott Street to Bellevue Avenue which are still dug up. I understand a short stretch from Bellevue to Borden Street will become bi-directional to connect the Borden-Brunswick and Denison-Belleview bikeways.

Going westbound, only one block west of Borden Street has been dug up.

As for east of Spadina Avenue, I noticed back in June that parking curbs have been put in as far east as McCaul Street.

Unfortunately, work on the Palmerston Avenue contraflow from College to Bloor Streets hasn’t started while passing through this area.

Bloor Street Construction

For those of you who ride on Bloor Street, work on extending the bike lanes from Runnymede Road to Aberfoyle Crescent starts tomorrow! I will try to swing by during the Labour Day long weekend to check on the progress and post about it.

High Park Improvements

While I haven’t checked out High Park since the City started permanently reducing motor vehicle access as part of the High Park Movement Strategy, here are a few posts I found on Twitter / X.

Portland – Dan Leckie Way Bikeway

Thanks to Luis Ledesma from the “Cycling in Toronto” Facebook group, I was informed that the City will be hosting public consultations this fall regarding implementing bi-directional cycle tracks on Portland Street and Dan Leckie Way. This would not only serve as a southern extension of the existing Brunswick-Borden-Bellevue-Denison bikeway – a new name for this route is badly needed – but also provide a much needed Waterfront connection between Fort York Boulevard and Simcoe Street. Installation is expected to happen in 2024 pending council approval.

Portland - Dan Leckie Bikeway (via City of Toronto)

Next Steps

It’s always a good time to see new bikeways being built. However, we still need to keep the pressure on Mayor Olivia Chow and City Council to ensure this progress gets ramped up. Especially for those outside of downtown.

With Twitter / X going down the tubes, I encourage you to look me up on Mastodon, Bluesky, or Threads to stay updated on new blog posts and other cycling developments in this city. You can also subscribe on the right side of this website to get notifications of new posts via e-mail.

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