This might be a good time to lay out our wish list for 2006.
• Do not approve the EUCAN monster bins: Within the coming months, the City’s Works Committee will vote on whether to approve the EUCAN monster garbage bin pilot project. The receptacles are billboards first, and trash bins second. Little thought seems to have been put into how people will actually use the bin, but its perpendicular placement on the sidewalk seems to have been seriously thought-out. The last thing these monstrosities do is help make this a clean and beautiful city. Also, the pilot project for the “info pillars” will come back to committee this winter. Scrap that one, too. We need to get our priorities straight and start thinking about what is best for the person on the sidewalk.
• Start construction on St. Clair streetcar right-of-way: Today would have marked the fifth month of construction on the St. Clair dedicated streetcar line. Instead, a small group of store owners and residents have derailed the process with legal wranglings. Which is sad since the community came out to the 50-plus meetings in 2005 and a majority of residents were in favour of the ROW. Mixing different types of traffic is the recipe for a congestion which benefits no one. ROWs are part of this city’s future.
• Less smog days: Toronto had a record number of smog days in 2005. Please, try and convince your friends and family members to walk, rollerblade, ride a bike, or take transit whenever possible. Thousands of people die in this city each year from the effects of pollution. Our rivers and ravines are more stressed than ever. We need to change our habits. And soon.
• Don’t ban postering: While the City wimpishly allows almost every outdoor advertising company to do what it wishes with the public realm, some city councillors are fed up with the mess of posters on our utility poles. They approve immense video billboards and ignore studies done by City staff that inidicate these screens distract drivers. They let our subway stations and streetcars to be swallowed up by massive ad campaigns. In some wards, nearly 50% of the billboards are erected without the City’s approval. Somehow, these same councillors are concerned about garage sale signs and rock show posters cluttering our streets?
• The Bike Plan becomes more than a plan: Toronto is quickly falling behind other Canadian cities (forget about European and American cities) when it comes to bicycle friendliness. The City built a whopping 1-kilometre of bike lanes in 2005. The 10-year plan calls for 485 kilometres of lanes to be built by 2011. In four years, Torontonians have 59km of lanes to use. At this rate, it will take 32 years to implement this plan. We need better advocates on council and at City Hall to make this a priority.
• Public space issues become election issues: In Novemeber 2006, Toronto will have an election for mayor and city councillors. We believe public space issues are some of the most pressing and important concerns facing this city. Bad architecture and development, a privatized waterfront, lack of funds for transit, an increasingly commercialized streetscape, homelessness, horrible traffic congestion…. We need to take our concerns to candidates and incumbents to find out where they stand on these issues. Hopefully, we will have some new faces on council that will champion these causes.
