No more protected bike lanes on busy Brampton street, council votes

Only one member of Brampton City Council voted “no” to scrap protected bike lanes on a busy local street, despite city staff saying the removal will lead to more congestion and speeding in the same area.

The push to remove the protected bike lanes on Howden Boulevard was led by Ward 7 Coun. Rod Power, who for months has been urging his council colleagues to get rid of the cycle track between Dixie Road and Williams Parkway.

Power says the lanes, which include concrete barriers, are blocking turning traffic and “imprisoning people” in their neighbourhoods, and a petition started last year also called for the “removal/relocation” of the Howden bike lanes.

Council had been working on a compromise solution that would maintain cyclist safety while keeping vehicle traffic moving, with five options put forward by city staff. But the matter came to a head last week, when Power put forward a motion during Brampton’s budget meetings calling for the bike lane removal in favour of sharrows “to maintain cycling accommodation.”

The motion passed with the support of all members of council, except for Coun. Rowena Santos.

That means Howden will eventually go back to four lanes of traffic, something city staff say will increase traffic volume, “cut through” traffic, and decrease the volume of cyclists using the corridor.

Funds of $337,000 have been earmarked for the bike lane removal, and another $393,000 will be used for future bike lane “relocation projects” and the Howden multi-use path.

Removing the protected bike lanes will increase average speeds to over the speed limit, especially now that Brampton has no speed enforcement cameras, staff told council.

And while Power did agree to an amendment from Santos that will see the city build a multi-use path to replace the protected bike lanes and add “sharrows” – a painted lane with bicycle symbols showing that drivers need to share the road with cyclists – he shut down a proposal for painted lanes along Howden.

The Howden bike lanes are Brampton’s “only east-west corridor for active transportation,” and Santos said scrapping the protected lanes “speaks against some of the goals that are outlined in the Brampton Mobility Plan.”

“Sharrows are not an alternative to a bike lane, and (they) will completely reverse all the progress that we have made with respect to speeding and traffic calming,” Santos said at the meeting last Tuesday.

Bike lanes have been a sticking point for Ontario Premier Doug Ford, but an Ontario Superior Court judge ruled in July that a provincial law to remove three stretches of Toronto bike lanes was unconstitutional.

The government appealed the decision and the Court of Appeal for Ontario is set to hear the case this month, but Transportation Minister Prabmeet Sarkaria says the province will restore lanes of vehicle traffic but keep bike lanes on a short stretch of Bloor Street West in Toronto, at a cost of $750,000.

The city will be updating its active transportation master plan to include the removal of the Howden bike lanes, and to align with any provincial decisions.