Let's not repeat the same old cycle

June is Bike Month in Toronto, but city hall isn't necessarily giving cyclists a reason to shift their celebrations into high gear this year.

- MATT ELLIOTT

Big number: 75 kilometres, the total length of new bike lanes expected to be installed under Toronto city hall's 2022-2024 cycling network plan. The target was 100 kilometres.

Toronto's new bike lane plan calls for the same three-year target as the old plan. There's no denying that city hall has made some real progress on installing bike infrastructure over the past few years, Matt Elliott writes, but there's also no denying that there is room to be more ambitious.

Sure, a new report on a plan for growing the city's network of bike lanes over the next three years tries to put a positive spin on things, but, by the numbers, the plan comes up short of real ambition. The 2025-27 bike lane plan approved last week by city hall's infrastructure committee and set to be considered by city council at their meeting later this month is, quantitatively, the same as the old plan, maintaining the same three-year target of 100 kilometres of new bike lanes installed over three years.

Also coming up short? The transportation department's work to install bike infrastructure approved in 2021 under the previous threeyear bike network plan. The report says they're "on track to deliver 75 kilometres of the 100 kilometres of new bikeways committed by the end of 2024." The report implies that's an achievement, noting that it represents an upward trend over the previous rate of installation, but, well, let's be real. In school, scoring 75 out of 100 generally earns you a B. It's not a failure. But it's not great either. It's just... OK.