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National Post
2 days ago
- Politics
- National Post
Christopher Dummitt: Judge brought politics through the back door in Toronto bike lane case
The recent decision by the Ontario Superior Court rendering the removal of Toronto's bike lanes unconstitutional recalls the great Dr. Seuss book Oh, The Thinks You Can Think. Just think how we could change Canada if we take the logic of this ruling and keep going. Article content Oh, the thinks we could think. Article content Article content The case, Cycle Toronto et al. v. Ontario, parsed the Ford government's decision to close bike lanes on several Toronto streets. A group of cycling activists protested the closure, claiming that closing the bike lanes would not improve traffic congestion (as claimed by the government) and, most importantly, that it would harm cyclists. Article content Article content This last point was key as it was central to the cyclists' argument that the removal of bike lanes would infringe their Section 7 Charter right to 'life, liberty and security of the person.' Article content Article content Justice Paul Schabas sided with the cycling activists. He didn't state that bike lanes were a right, rather, that removing bike lanes would violate the rights of cyclists, as their evidence showed that they would be more likely to be injured and or killed on roads without separated bike lanes. Article content On the messy question of balancing interests between cyclists and drivers, and the different priorities of government, the judge seems to have simply relied on the expert testimony provided to him on road safety and traffic congestion — as well as his own wise opinion on how to interpret it all. Article content Reading the ruling takes me back to my university political theory days and to Plato's Republic with its philosopher kings. But here it's made modern — a vision of government via technocratic expertise, refracted through judicial wisdom. Article content Article content Imagine what other controversial political questions could be answered by experts and judges without the messy interference of politicians and democracy. Article content How about Premier Doug Ford's choice to raise the speed limits on some highways? Experts have already warned that higher speed limits lead to more traffic fatalities. This initiative might be considered unconstitutional if we apply the reasoning in the Cycle Toronto ruling. Article content But why stop there? Let's go to federal politics. The Carney government has said that it isn't going to expand pharmacare. But won't this damage Canadians' health? Couldn't this, too, be said to infringe upon our wildly expanded notion of Section 7 rights to 'life, liberty and security of the person'? Article content Perhaps Ford shouldn't have been allowed to let alcohol be sold in Ontario's grocery stores and convenience stores. If this leads to higher rates of alcohol use, especially among youth, and we know that alcohol is bad for our health, then this policy can be said to have harmful effects. Article content If you really wanted to think big about our Section 7 rights, even Canada's national defence policy can be considered harmful to Canadians. Too much spending might risk a greater chance of war and harm. Or, it could be that not enough spending risks conflict. It's hard to know. Luckily, according to the logic of the Cycle Toronto ruling, we don't need to worry. We can just rely on the expert class — overseen by a benevolent judge — to decide for us. Article content This ruling doesn't come out of nowhere, of course. The debate on judicial activism is longstanding in our post-Charter Canada — on how much or how little deference judges should give to parliaments. Article content But it's worth noting that the judges and the experts who testify before them don't come out of a vacuum. These are real people with individual political preferences. We already know the lopsided, left-leaning world of the university from which our 'experts' emerge. This kind of political skew misshapes peer review and undermines the expertise that judges rely on in court. Article content Law schools are, sadly, no different. Law schools like the one at Queen's led the way in erasing John A. Macdonald from its building a few years ago. And before he became a judge, Justice Schabas himself led the charge to modernize and decolonize the Law Society of Upper Canada by switching its name to the Law Society of Ontario. He was also involved in mandating Ontario lawyers to promote diversity, equity and inclusion. Article content It would be a lot easier to trust judicial oversight if it were, in fact, neutral. But rulings like Cycle Toronto show how a judge can work politics through the back door of judicial activism. In the process, they wildly inflate the notion of rights far beyond anything that was imagined back when the Charter was created in 1982. Article content Journalist Andrew Coyne recently said that he is a critic of the 'notwithstanding clause,' that section of the 1982 Constitution that allows governments to temporarily override Charter rights. He says he much prefers Section 1 of the Charter, the 'reasonable limits clause,' which requires that judges place reasonable limits on Charter rights. The clause would ideally safeguard us from rights-based extremism in the courts, which could prevent society and government from functioning collectively. Article content This is an entirely defensible position. But it depends on judges having a cautious approach to new rights claims. It depends on judges realizing that overriding policy set in the courts should be the very last resort. It depends on a ruling like Cycle Toronto being overturned and being seen as the political overreach that it very clearly is. Article content
CTV News
03-08-2025
- Politics
- CTV News
A judge struck down the Ford government's bike lane removals in Toronto. What comes next?
This week an Ontario court struck down a provincial law that required three bike lanes to be removed in Toronto and which also limited the installation of new bike lanes by municipalities. The decision handed a big win to advocacy group Cycle Toronto and two individual cyclists who challenged the law in court. Here's what you need to know about case and what might come next: What was the law meant to do Bill 212, titled the 'Reducing Gridlock, Saving You Time Act' was introduced in the legislature in October and passed the following month. Among other things, it called for the removal of bike lanes along Bloor Street, Yonge Street and University Avenue in Toronto. Why did the judge strike it down? Ultimately, the judge agreed with the evidence that removal of the bike lanes would put people at increased risk of harm and death, violating the right to life and security of the person under the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms enshrined in the constitution. But perhaps more importantly, the judge found that the government had not presented any evidence to support its claims. 'It's a spectacular failure on the part of the Ontario government to defend its decision to remove bike lanes,' David Schneiderman told A professor of constitutional law at the University of Toronto, Schneiderman said the government's case had little chance of success, even if the judge had been sympathetic, because of the lack of evidence to back up the province's claims. 'It's hard to predict many of these kinds of charter claims. It depends on how deferential a judge wants to be,' Schneiderman said. 'But it wasn't available to judge Schabas to be deferential because there was no evidence, and the Ontario government's own experts failed to show that there was any correlation between removing bike lanes and improving congestion in the City of Toronto.' Ontario bike lanes A cyclist rides in a bike lane on University Avenue in Toronto on Friday, December 13, 2024. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Laura Proctor (Laura Proctor/The Canadian Press) What message does the ruling send? 'It should send a message to this province and others that when they're providing services of whatever sort, when they act in ways that endanger lives, physical security, or generally make the situation worse for the people who are receiving those services without some evidence to support that decision, then it might very well be that it'll give rise to a charter claim,' Schneiderman said. What happens next? The government has already said that it plans to appeal the ruling, however Schneiderman said it will likely face an uphill battle because there is so little evidence the government presented in the original case. 'When cases go on appeal, the facts that are on the record are not contested. They can't be,' Schneiderman said. 'The hearing established certain facts, and the fact is that there was no evidence offered by the government to support the decision to remove bike lanes. So without facts to support their decision, it's a real uphill climb.' Why is government bothering with case if it's weak? While the government may have lost in court, they scored a win in another way, one political observer pointed out. 'They believe that the public is on their side. They particularly believe that their voter coalition is heavily opposed to bike lanes,' CTV News Political Analyst Scott Reid pointed out. 'So they think that the visibility of this sue, the volume with which they pursued it, and the conflict that's produced by a court challenge and even a court loss helps amplify their championing of this issue and therefore cements their political position. 'Arguably, they believe they are bigger winners by being losers, because it catapults this issue back to the front of the news cycle and reignites coverage and conversation, and they are positive that they're the overwhelming beneficiaries of that.' Biking A cyclist rides in a bike lane on University Avenue in Toronto on Friday, December 13, 2024. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Laura Proctor But in addition to being seen as champions against gridlock, Reid said, the issue gives the government an enemy to fight against. 'This issue forces their preferred opponents to come out and vocally support bike lanes, which the Ford government believes not only puts those stakeholders at odds with the general public, but they think it even puts them at odds with traditional downtown voting coalitions,' Reid said. 'They think this is an orphan issue that has relatively few champions, but for hardcore urbanists and so they see this as pure political charm.' But while the cycling advocates win in court and the government scores a political win, it's the voters who are ultimately the losers, Reid said, if they end up paying for infrastructure to be built and then ripped up, as well as for a court battle to be fought over the issue. What about the notwithstanding clause? If the government were to appeal the case and lose, it could still use the notwithstanding clause to override the charter. But would it? The Ford government has shown a willingness to do so before. It used the notwithstanding clause to push through a law limiting third party election advertising in 2021. It also threatened to use the clause when it unilaterally shrunk the size of Toronto City Council just ahead of a municipal election in 2018, and moved to block a teacher's strike in 2022. Schneiderman agrees the government could decide to make use of the clause if it loses an appeal in court, but he added that whether it does so could come down to a matter of public opinion over the issue. 'In my view, the notwithstanding clause is there to protect the citizens from rogue courts that make decisions that are against the public interest,' Schneiderman said. 'It's not just for provinces or the federal government to use in the case of a popularity contest. It's not about that. It shouldn't be.' In this case the question could be 'how popular are cyclists' in Toronto, Schneiderman said. He explains that while the notwithstanding clause is available to the government to override charter rights, voters could punish governments that curtail them. 'It's not a really popular thing. People like their rights. People like the fact that they have rights, and they don't like governments to be seen to be trampling on them.' Reid said there's another reason the government might be hesitant to invoking the notwithstanding clause. 'I would be surprised if they reached for the notwithstanding clause, for no other reason than they might fear that it actually pollutes this issue, and instead of allowing them to repeat their arguments around bike lanes and enjoy the cut and thrust of the usual suspects who oppose the Ford government on bike lanes, that it might transform the issue, sort of alchemize it into something else that's got less public appeal and might cut more against their grain,' Reid said. He added that they've 'been burned' by using it in the past since its use itself becomes a polarizing issue that may invite questions about other rights being curbed.
CBC
03-08-2025
- Politics
- CBC
Alberta minister threatens to axe bike lanes. Can he make his case?
Social Sharing The provincial government that routinely demands Ottawa stay in its jurisdictional lane is keen to swerve into another jurisdiction's lanes. Bicycle lanes. Transportation Minister Devin Dreeshen has signalled he wants cities, particularly Edmonton and Calgary, to alter or remove any cycling lanes that impede automobile traffic — and avoid future bike lanes that do so. If they don't, Alberta might create the powers to do so itself. Alberta wouldn't be the first province to insert itself into the bike lane debate, following fellow conservative politicians in Ontario and, more recently, Nova Scotia. Whether it's dubbed ending the " war on cars" or fighting for " common sense," the fight over which road users get asphalt space has sounded similar across the country. But there are lessons in a new court ruling that struck down the largest province's bid to tear out bike lanes in Toronto, beyond the constitutional violations cited by the judge. Ontario launched its plan to dismantle Toronto bike-lane barriers by stating, repeatedly, that they worsen vehicle congestion by compromising vehicle space. It's the same logic Dreeshen applied last month, ahead of his meeting on the topic with Calgary Mayor Jyoti Gondek: "While we fund major infrastructure projects, like the Deerfoot [Trail], to improve traffic flow and reduce congestion, some local decisions are moving in the opposite direction, removing driving lanes." Cycle Toronto's court challenge of Ontario's "Reducing Gridlock, Saving You Time Act" got the courts to peel back the advice and research that underpinned Ontario's claims against bike lanes. Or, mainly, the lack thereof. "To the contrary, records produced by the government in this litigation show that the internal advice prior to passing Bill 212 was that protected bike lanes can have a positive impact on congestion and that removing them would do little, if anything, to alleviate gridlock, and may worsen congestion," Ontario Justice Paul Schabas' ruling states. Reaction pours in after Ontario judge blocks Ford's bike lane removal plan 3 days ago The decision refers to an engineering firm the province hired to study its car lane restoration. It reported: "While removing the bike lanes and replacing them with traffic lanes may increase the vehicle capacity along the immediate length of the roadway, the actual alleviation of congestion may be negligible or short-lived due to other confounding factors or induced demand." Induced demand refers to a well-travelled concept in transportation engineering that expanding road capacity will attract more automobiles, and therefore restore any congestion that briefly gets eliminated. (Meanwhile, Schabas also found that the health and safety risks to cyclists if they lost their barrier-protected routes through key parts of downtown Toronto was easily proven.) Would the rise and ebb in vehicle traffic behave any differently if the protective curbs for safer biking were removed in favour of an extra driving lane on 12th Avenue S. or Fifth Street S.W. in Calgary? Dreeshen emerged from his July 30 meeting with Calgary Mayor Jyoti Gondek pleased that she agreed with his interest in removing problematic bike lanes. "These bike lanes are not fixed," she told reporters after the sit-down. "If a bike lane is causing any concerns with congestion or parking, our traffic team is open to reviewing and making any necessary changes." The question, then, could come down to whether Calgary and Alberta could find a problem that Toronto and Ontario did not. In 2015, the city added its downtown network of temporary barrier-protected bike lanes on a few streets, as a pilot project. City officials measured the change in motorist travel times next to the bike-safety bollards. Along an eight-block stretch of Eighth Avenue S.W., there was no change in westbound traffic during the afternoon peak, and a 15-second decrease going the opposite way in the morning, according to a 2016 city report. What impact did the cycle lanes on Fifth Street have, for their 14 blocks? In the afternoon rush, commutes were up by 10 seconds. Morning travel times rose by 90 seconds along the downtown-spanning stretch of 12th Avenue S., including an added 13 seconds of delay at the intersection of two new bike lanes — but officials in that report pledged to review signal timing and road design before the lane would become permanent. Would these numbers justify the removal of bicycle lanes, having not persuaded council to do so back then? And what trade-offs are acceptable for creating a safe route for cyclists around the city's centre? The city also measures the number of cyclists (and other users) getting into and going through Calgary's business core. In that respect, the statistics show little before-and-after change, despite promoters' high hopes for a big boost to cyclist numbers. In 2014, before the protected bike lanes, the share of downtown commuters who came in or out on two wheels was 1.7 per cent. Rates rose before the pandemic to 2.7 per cent in 2017 — that still looks puny in relative numbers, but that's more than a 50 per cent jump in bike commutes. However, it dipped to 1.9 per cent in the 2024 transportation count. Dreeshen remarked on that figure after his meeting with Gondek. " So that means 98 per cent of people are commuting on a daily basis in their vehicles," he told CBC Radio's The Homestretch. "And obviously when you take away a driving lane for vehicles to put in a bike lane you're helping that small two per cent of commuters at the expense of drivers." Dreeshen is incorrect that it's two versus 98 per cent, as the non-cycling total also includes transit users and people walking into downtown; automobile drivers and passengers account for 59 per cent of downtown visits, according to city statistics. And there's another statistic that Gondek highlighted after seeing the minister: less than one per cent of Calgary's road surface is dedicated to bicycles. This certainly stands to become political fodder, coming into the fall's municipal votes. A conservative-aligned Edmonton mayoral candidate is echoing provincial rhetoric with a promise to halt any new bicycle lanes, and Calgary Coun. Dan McLean has said he wants the Eighth Avenue route axed and others reviewed. Meanwhile, the UCP issued a letter to members this week in Dreeshen's name, urging them to weigh in on a party survey's question about a potential bike lane crackdown — along with other questions inviting supporters to endorse existing UCP policies on taxes, school library content and private surgery clinics. "Of course, not everyone lives downtown. But many of us travel into the city for work, errands, or events, and we feel the impact too," Dreeshen's party email stated. This rhetoric gets at the heart of why provincial conservatives like to make hay about curbs and lane paint in a city's core, where voters tend to skew NDP or Liberal. Their own suburban and small-town base would likely be bothered by road space they can't drive on or park in, especially on a busy game night or lunch hour when they venture downtown. Just as planning the route for the Green Line LRT is supposed to be the city's jurisdiction, so is the addition and subtraction of bicycle lanes — though at least with the LRT, the Smith government can argue they're a funding partner. The Smith government's keen interest in downtown bicycle barriers comes alongside Municipal Affairs Minister Dan Williams' comments this week to Postmedia, about cities' business being provincial business. "Every single municipality in this province from the biggest cities to the smallest summer villages are creatures of legislation enacted by this legislature and this government has authority over those municipalities," he said. Technically, this is true, as it is in Ontario and elsewhere. It's not common, however, for provincial ministers or the premier to state this fact, given all its implications for interventions into the decisions of elected city or town councils. "I'd like to see the premier stay in his lane — and it's not a bike lane," a Halifax city councillor said about Nova Scotia Premier Tim Houston's threats to crack down on a cycling infrastructure proposal he has opposed.
National Post
31-07-2025
- Politics
- National Post
Michael Taube: Of course Ontario's activist judiciary would invent a right to bike lanes
Removing bike lanes is … unconstitutional? Article content I know it sounds completely insane. Yet, that's exactly what the Ontario Superior Court ruled on Wednesday with respect to Premier Doug Ford's plan to remove bike lanes on three busy Toronto intersections — Bloor Street, Yonge Street and University Avenue — to improve the flow of traffic and reduce congestion. Article content Article content The advocacy group Cycle Toronto set out last December to prevent the lanes from being removed: in a notice filed to the court, it claimed the Ontario government had 'embarked on an ill-conceived, arbitrary and hurried legislative campaign against people who ride bikes in the City of Toronto by mandating the removal of approximately 19 kilometres of protected bike lanes.' This, it added, was done 'in full awareness of, or lacking all concern about, the increased number of injuries and deaths that will result.' Hence, the cycling advocates wanted to bring an end to this 'reckless legislative act.' Article content Article content Ontario Superior Court Justice Paul Schabas granted an injunction on April 22 that temporarily paused the removal of the bike lanes. This was ridiculous in itself, but even worse was his decision Wednesday to take the side of Cycle Toronto. Article content Article content 'The evidence shows that restoring lanes for cars will not result in less congestion, as it will induce more people to use cars and therefore any reduction in driving time will be short-lived, if at all, and will lead to more congestion,' Justice Schabas wrote. He also accepted the expert testimony on Cycle Toronto's behalf that 'bicycle lanes, and in particular separated or protected bicycle lanes, reduce motor vehicle traffic congestion by providing an alternative method of transportation that is safer for all users of the roads.' Moreover, the removal of these bike lanes 'will put people at increased risk of harm and death, which engages the right to life and security of the person.' Hence, the ruling stated that 'any steps taken to 'reconfigure' the target bike lanes that removes their protected character for the purpose of installing a lane for motor vehicles in order to reduce congestion, would be in breach of s. 7 of the Charter.' (This particular section of the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms ensures that 'everyone has the right to life, liberty and security of the person and the right not to be deprived thereof except in accordance with the principles of fundamental justice.') Article content Article content The Superior Court ruling is preposterous on many levels. Creating bike lanes in our cities and communities has always been an impediment to traffic. They reduce the amount of space on the roads for cars and trucks to move at proper speeds, which slows down the overall traffic flow and creates more congestion. At the same time, anyone who has ever driven a car on a busy street in a metropolitan city like Toronto knows that plenty of cyclists weave in and out of traffic. Cars and trucks are therefore forced to slow down to avoid hitting, injuring or killing cyclists who don't seem to care where a city's bike lanes have been painted. Article content While people are free to ride bikes for work, exercise and transportation, they're not making our roads any safer and they're consistently slowing down traffic. Any so-called 'expert' who suggests otherwise likely doesn't have much experience driving vehicles of the four-wheel variety.
Hamilton Spectator
31-07-2025
- Politics
- Hamilton Spectator
Court strikes down Ford plan to remove Toronto bike lanes
Transportation advocates are celebrating after an Ontario judge has ruled that the Ford government's plan to remove bike lanes from three major Toronto roads is unconstitutional, citing risks to public safety and a lack of evidence to support the province's claims. In a decision released Wednesday , Superior Court Justice Paul Schabas said the plan violates Charter rights, which protects the right to life and security of the person. In an interview with Canada's National Observer, Michael Longfield, executive director of Cycle Toronto, said the decision is 'a huge victory' in their long legal fight. 'Today's decision is a historic victory for Torontonians and everyone who rides a bike in our city,' Longfield said. 'The facts, and now the law, are both clear that bike lanes are part of the solution to tackling traffic and congestion, and that ripping them out will put people's lives at risk.' Last year, the Ford government passed legislation — Bill 212 — to remove bike lanes on Bloor Street, Yonge Street and University Avenue, arguing it would help reduce traffic congestion. The ruling follows months of legal battles brought by Cycle Toronto and two individual applicants , arguing removing the lanes would put cyclists at greater risk and violate their Charter rights. The court agreed, and Schabas said injuries and deaths could result from taking out protected lanes and those harms are far too great compared to the small or non-existent traffic benefits. The judge said the evidence showed removing bike lanes would likely make traffic worse by encouraging more people to drive, something advocates have argued since the legislation was released. 'The impugned provision will also have a serious and disproportionate impact on children and on low-income individuals who must ride bicycles as an economical means of transportation, or for their work,' Schabas wrote in his decision. The ruling found the law was 'arbitrary' and not based on solid evidence. The government had been warned by its own experts that the plan wouldn't work to reduce traffic. Longfield hopes the ruling will push the province to respect local decision-making and public input in future transportation planning. 'Ripping out bike lanes that were put in through proper city processes won't fix congestion — it puts people's lives at risk,' he added. 'That's true whether it's in Toronto or anywhere in Ontario.' In response to the ruling, a spokesperson for the Ontario Ministry of Transportation said the government plans to appeal. 'We were elected by the people of Ontario with a clear mandate to restore lanes of traffic and get drivers moving by moving bike lanes off of major roads to secondary roads,' the statement read. 'To deliver on that mandate, we will be appealing the court's decision.' Earlier this year, the court granted a temporary injunction blocking the government from removing the lanes while the case was under review. In May, the government tried to appeal that injunction, but the court rejected the request . Lindsay Beck, a lawyer at Ecojustice who represented the applicants, said the ruling sends an important message that governments cannot ignore public safety without facing constitutional consequences. 'The decision makes clear that where government action arbitrarily causes harm, the rights protected by section 7 of the Charter are engaged,' Beck said in a statement. 'That's exactly what the government did when it enacted legislation to remove protected bike lanes in the face of its own expert evidence that doing so won't alleviate congestion and will put lives at risk.' Error! Sorry, there was an error processing your request. There was a problem with the recaptcha. Please try again. You may unsubscribe at any time. By signing up, you agree to our terms of use and privacy policy . This site is protected by reCAPTCHA and the Google privacy policy and terms of service apply. Want more of the latest from us? Sign up for more at our newsletter page .
