{"id":50654,"date":"2015-01-19T07:30:28","date_gmt":"2015-01-19T12:30:28","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/spacing.ca\/toronto\/?p=50654"},"modified":"2015-01-19T09:09:55","modified_gmt":"2015-01-19T14:09:55","slug":"lorinc-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/spacing.ca\/toronto\/2015\/01\/19\/lorinc-2\/","title":{"rendered":"LORINC: Tory needs to use new traffic data to fight congestion"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"feature-lorinc\"<\/a><\/p>\n

To absolutely no one\u2019s surprise, Mayor John Tory has emerged as the kind of leader who looks both ways \u2014 all puns and double entendres intended \u2014 before he crosses the political road.<\/p>\n

In the past few weeks, Tory has been a veritable whirling dervish of apparently sober policy consideration, establishing reviews and\/or taskforces on issues ranging from affordable housing<\/a> (to be led by\u00a0senator and former mayor Art Eggleton), to Section 37 contributions<\/a>, garbage collection outsourcing,<\/a> and mental health<\/a>.<\/p>\n

On Friday afternoon, we also learned he wants council to approve further $1.65 million for studies on Smart Track<\/a>, over and above the $750,000 approved before Christmas.<\/p>\n

At this rate, he\u2019ll eventually have to establish a panel to study all the studies.<\/p>\n

I shouldn\u2019t mock. Tory, throughout the campaign and since taking office, has sought to present himself as a left-brain leader who privileges reasoned policy responses<\/a> over feel-good partisan gestures. At the same time, he\u2019s also made it clear that his rational, managerial approach shouldn\u2019t stop City officials from doing what seems right instead of what the rule book says \u2014 for example, opening warming shelters on bitterly cold nights even if the temperature hasn\u2019t quite crossed the threshold established in the City\u2019s procedure manuals.<\/p>\n

What\u2019s not yet clear, to me anyway, is whether Tory intends to push council and City officials to figure out how they will also be able to demonstrate that all the various initiatives currently in the policy oven actually deliver results.<\/p>\n

After all, it\u2019s one thing for the City to implement all sorts of fixes. But it seems reasonable to expect that residents, down the road, be provided with evidence demonstrating that the measures which emerge from this frenzy of policy concoction end up making the city a better place to live and work. Conversely, if some new Tory-branded policy ends up falling flat, we should know that, too.<\/p>\n

As the accountants say, if you can\u2019t measure it, you can\u2019t manage it.<\/p>\n

On this front, one of Tory\u2019s marquis moves to date comes up oddly short. Before the Christmas break, he unveiled a much-hyped six-point plan to fight congestion<\/a>: tougher\u00a0enforcement, steeper fees and fines for commercial or construction vehicles blocking lanes, better timed and coordinated signals, red light cameras, traffic management teams \u2014 the whole enchilada. And true to his word, Tory rang in 2015 by ordering stepped up enforcement \u2014 a gesture that vaguely reminded me of Rob Ford\u2019s anti-graffiti blitz in the early months of 2011. (TOry also asked the TTC to formally implement\u00a0 all-door boarding on the King streetcar<\/a> to speed up service.)<\/p>\n

But if you study the traffic plan closely, it becomes apparent that it doesn\u2019t include any way of tracking whether overall congestion in the city has actually improved over time. Indeed, transportation officials told me this week the City hasn\u2019t established any kind of baseline flow on targeted corridors against which future traffic can be compared. It seems like a significant oversight.<\/p>\n

Indeed, the question is, how will voters know if traffic has actually improved thanks to Tory\u2019s six point plan? Proof by example? I hope not.<\/p>\n

In fairness to the City\u2019s transportation officials, the task of measuring traffic flow is notoriously difficult, and subject to all sorts of imponderables \u2013 extreme weather, random accidents, changes in built form and so on. The precipitous decline in oil prices, adds Stephen Buckley, general manager of Toronto’s Transportation Services, may also lead to more driving and thus more congestion. \u201cThis is definitely a challenge.\u201d<\/p>\n

According to Buckley, the City in the midst of a four-year project to re-time traffic signals on 31 congested arterials around the city, and he says a before\/after report will be ready next month. The City will begin to use GPS signals on transit vehicles to determine how policy moves, such as extended peak-hour parking bans, impact service on the King and Queen streetcars.<\/p>\n

As Buckley explained to a conference on big data and transportation management in Washington earlier this month [Download PDF<\/a>], the City is also installing traffic cameras, mirroring those on the 400-series highways, at intersections across the city \u2013 the roll-out began in 2013 and will continue to 2016 \u2013 and is even experimenting with drones fitted out with cameras.<\/p>\n

\"2011-2016<\/a><\/p>\n

Finally, Transportation Services and a company called Brisk Synergies<\/a> has put out a cycling app that aggregates user data <\/a>from GPS signals to develop a map of route usage that\u2019s meant to inform the creation of a new cycling plan for the City.<\/p>\n

Somewhat further off are still experimental big data technologies, such as the deployment of WIFI or blue-tooth enabled sensors on streets that can suck up signals from passing vehicles in order to develop highly textured readings of what\u2019s happening on the roads that go \u00a0beyond the kind of information delivered by the traditional \u201cloop\u201d counters embedded in road surfaces<\/a>.<\/p>\n

For transportation geeks, the dawn of the age of big data offers up all sorts of opportunities and applications \u2014 for example, Copenhagen\u2019s bike counter pillars<\/a>, which show daily and annual usage<\/a>.<\/p>\n

But in Toronto, it\u2019s by no means obvious how City officials plan to distill all this new technical data into user-friendly information that is legible to the general public and offers residents a way of easily comprehending Toronto\u2019s transportation performance as a counter-point to the distortions of personal anecdote and opportunistic rhetoric (e.g., Ford\u2019s deeply dishonest \u201cSt. Clair disaster\u201d).<\/p>\n

In fact, if Tory genuinely wants to fight congestion \u2014 and I think he does \u2014 it seems to me that he\u2019s got to push City officials to come up with some kind of dashboard that paints an integrated picture of what\u2019s actually happening on the city\u2019s streets, its cycling networks, and its transit system. News we can use, and which we don\u2019t need a civil engineering degree to understand.<\/p>\n

From where I sit, that ought to be the seventh point in Tory\u2019s six point plan.<\/p>\n

photo by Michael Gil<\/em><\/a><\/p>\n

Come to the Spacing Store<\/a> to pick up the new the issue of Spacing focused on new technologies available to cities.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

To absolutely no one\u2019s surprise, Mayor John Tory has emerged as the kind of leader who looks both ways \u2014 all puns and double entendres intended \u2014 before he crosses the political road. In the past few weeks, Tory has been a veritable whirling dervish of apparently sober policy consideration, establishing reviews and\/or taskforces onContinue reading “LORINC: Tory needs to use new traffic data to fight congestion”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4051,"featured_media":50664,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"_ef_editorial_meta_paragraph_assignment":"","_ef_editorial_meta_date_first-draft-date":"","_ef_editorial_meta_checkbox_needs-photo":"","_ef_editorial_meta_number_word-count":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[2,9,8],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-50654","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-politics","category-traffic","category-transit"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\nLORINC: Tory needs to use new traffic data to fight congestion - Spacing Toronto<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/spacing.ca\/toronto\/2015\/01\/19\/lorinc-2\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"LORINC: Tory needs to use new traffic data to fight congestion - Spacing Toronto\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"To absolutely no one\u2019s surprise, Mayor John Tory has emerged as the kind of leader who looks both ways \u2014 all puns and double entendres intended \u2014 before he crosses the political road. In the past few weeks, Tory has been a veritable whirling dervish of apparently sober policy consideration, establishing reviews and\/or taskforces onContinue reading "LORINC: Tory needs to use new traffic data to fight congestion"\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/spacing.ca\/toronto\/2015\/01\/19\/lorinc-2\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Spacing Toronto\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2015-01-19T12:30:28+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2015-01-19T14:09:55+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/spacing.ca\/toronto\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/4\/2015\/01\/traffic-michael-gil.jpg\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"1024\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"768\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/jpeg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"John Lorinc\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:creator\" content=\"@Spacing\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:site\" content=\"@Spacing\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"John Lorinc\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"5 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/spacing.ca\/toronto\/2015\/01\/19\/lorinc-2\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/spacing.ca\/toronto\/2015\/01\/19\/lorinc-2\/\",\"name\":\"LORINC: Tory needs to use new traffic data to fight congestion - Spacing Toronto\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/spacing.ca\/toronto\/#website\"},\"primaryImageOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/spacing.ca\/toronto\/2015\/01\/19\/lorinc-2\/#primaryimage\"},\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/spacing.ca\/toronto\/2015\/01\/19\/lorinc-2\/#primaryimage\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"https:\/\/spacing.ca\/toronto\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/4\/2015\/01\/traffic-michael-gil.jpg\",\"datePublished\":\"2015-01-19T12:30:28+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2015-01-19T14:09:55+00:00\",\"author\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/spacing.ca\/toronto\/#\/schema\/person\/faff9da0e20b8f5223099d707e940d8e\"},\"breadcrumb\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/spacing.ca\/toronto\/2015\/01\/19\/lorinc-2\/#breadcrumb\"},\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"ReadAction\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/spacing.ca\/toronto\/2015\/01\/19\/lorinc-2\/\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/spacing.ca\/toronto\/2015\/01\/19\/lorinc-2\/#primaryimage\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/spacing.ca\/toronto\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/4\/2015\/01\/traffic-michael-gil.jpg\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\/\/spacing.ca\/toronto\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/4\/2015\/01\/traffic-michael-gil.jpg\",\"width\":1024,\"height\":768},{\"@type\":\"BreadcrumbList\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/spacing.ca\/toronto\/2015\/01\/19\/lorinc-2\/#breadcrumb\",\"itemListElement\":[{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":1,\"name\":\"Home\",\"item\":\"https:\/\/spacing.ca\/toronto\/\"},{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":2,\"name\":\"LORINC: Tory needs to use new traffic data to fight congestion\"}]},{\"@type\":\"WebSite\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/spacing.ca\/toronto\/#website\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/spacing.ca\/toronto\/\",\"name\":\"Spacing Toronto\",\"description\":\"Canadian Urbanism Uncovered | Toronto Architecture, Urban Design, Public Transit, City Hall, Parks, Walking, Bikes, Streetscape, History, Waterfront, Maps, Public Spaces\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"SearchAction\",\"target\":{\"@type\":\"EntryPoint\",\"urlTemplate\":\"https:\/\/spacing.ca\/toronto\/?s={search_term_string}\"},\"query-input\":{\"@type\":\"PropertyValueSpecification\",\"valueRequired\":true,\"valueName\":\"search_term_string\"}}],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\"},{\"@type\":\"Person\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/spacing.ca\/toronto\/#\/schema\/person\/faff9da0e20b8f5223099d707e940d8e\",\"name\":\"John Lorinc\",\"image\":{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/spacing.ca\/toronto\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/73e05cb61860b63be76ffccf72a4d736?s=96&d=blank&r=g\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/73e05cb61860b63be76ffccf72a4d736?s=96&d=blank&r=g\",\"caption\":\"John Lorinc\"},\"url\":\"https:\/\/spacing.ca\/toronto\/author\/john\/\"}]}<\/script>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"LORINC: Tory needs to use new traffic data to fight congestion - Spacing Toronto","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/spacing.ca\/toronto\/2015\/01\/19\/lorinc-2\/","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"LORINC: Tory needs to use new traffic data to fight congestion - Spacing Toronto","og_description":"To absolutely no one\u2019s surprise, Mayor John Tory has emerged as the kind of leader who looks both ways \u2014 all puns and double entendres intended \u2014 before he crosses the political road. In the past few weeks, Tory has been a veritable whirling dervish of apparently sober policy consideration, establishing reviews and\/or taskforces onContinue reading \"LORINC: Tory needs to use new traffic data to fight congestion\"","og_url":"https:\/\/spacing.ca\/toronto\/2015\/01\/19\/lorinc-2\/","og_site_name":"Spacing Toronto","article_published_time":"2015-01-19T12:30:28+00:00","article_modified_time":"2015-01-19T14:09:55+00:00","og_image":[{"width":1024,"height":768,"url":"https:\/\/spacing.ca\/toronto\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/4\/2015\/01\/traffic-michael-gil.jpg","type":"image\/jpeg"}],"author":"John Lorinc","twitter_card":"summary_large_image","twitter_creator":"@Spacing","twitter_site":"@Spacing","twitter_misc":{"Written by":"John Lorinc","Est. reading time":"5 minutes"},"schema":{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https:\/\/spacing.ca\/toronto\/2015\/01\/19\/lorinc-2\/","url":"https:\/\/spacing.ca\/toronto\/2015\/01\/19\/lorinc-2\/","name":"LORINC: Tory needs to use new traffic data to fight congestion - Spacing Toronto","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/spacing.ca\/toronto\/#website"},"primaryImageOfPage":{"@id":"https:\/\/spacing.ca\/toronto\/2015\/01\/19\/lorinc-2\/#primaryimage"},"image":{"@id":"https:\/\/spacing.ca\/toronto\/2015\/01\/19\/lorinc-2\/#primaryimage"},"thumbnailUrl":"https:\/\/spacing.ca\/toronto\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/4\/2015\/01\/traffic-michael-gil.jpg","datePublished":"2015-01-19T12:30:28+00:00","dateModified":"2015-01-19T14:09:55+00:00","author":{"@id":"https:\/\/spacing.ca\/toronto\/#\/schema\/person\/faff9da0e20b8f5223099d707e940d8e"},"breadcrumb":{"@id":"https:\/\/spacing.ca\/toronto\/2015\/01\/19\/lorinc-2\/#breadcrumb"},"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"ReadAction","target":["https:\/\/spacing.ca\/toronto\/2015\/01\/19\/lorinc-2\/"]}]},{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/spacing.ca\/toronto\/2015\/01\/19\/lorinc-2\/#primaryimage","url":"https:\/\/spacing.ca\/toronto\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/4\/2015\/01\/traffic-michael-gil.jpg","contentUrl":"https:\/\/spacing.ca\/toronto\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/4\/2015\/01\/traffic-michael-gil.jpg","width":1024,"height":768},{"@type":"BreadcrumbList","@id":"https:\/\/spacing.ca\/toronto\/2015\/01\/19\/lorinc-2\/#breadcrumb","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"Home","item":"https:\/\/spacing.ca\/toronto\/"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"LORINC: Tory needs to use new traffic data to fight congestion"}]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https:\/\/spacing.ca\/toronto\/#website","url":"https:\/\/spacing.ca\/toronto\/","name":"Spacing Toronto","description":"Canadian Urbanism Uncovered | Toronto Architecture, Urban Design, Public Transit, City Hall, Parks, Walking, Bikes, Streetscape, History, Waterfront, Maps, Public Spaces","potentialAction":[{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https:\/\/spacing.ca\/toronto\/?s={search_term_string}"},"query-input":{"@type":"PropertyValueSpecification","valueRequired":true,"valueName":"search_term_string"}}],"inLanguage":"en-US"},{"@type":"Person","@id":"https:\/\/spacing.ca\/toronto\/#\/schema\/person\/faff9da0e20b8f5223099d707e940d8e","name":"John Lorinc","image":{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/spacing.ca\/toronto\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/","url":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/73e05cb61860b63be76ffccf72a4d736?s=96&d=blank&r=g","contentUrl":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/73e05cb61860b63be76ffccf72a4d736?s=96&d=blank&r=g","caption":"John Lorinc"},"url":"https:\/\/spacing.ca\/toronto\/author\/john\/"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/spacing.ca\/toronto\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/50654","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/spacing.ca\/toronto\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/spacing.ca\/toronto\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/spacing.ca\/toronto\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4051"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/spacing.ca\/toronto\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=50654"}],"version-history":[{"count":8,"href":"https:\/\/spacing.ca\/toronto\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/50654\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":50669,"href":"https:\/\/spacing.ca\/toronto\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/50654\/revisions\/50669"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/spacing.ca\/toronto\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/50664"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/spacing.ca\/toronto\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=50654"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/spacing.ca\/toronto\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=50654"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/spacing.ca\/toronto\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=50654"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}