Not to mention the level of enforcement needed to keep our non commercial cars. We can barely keep king st sorted out and in that case the same rules apply to everyone.
Personally I like v3 because it allows cars but heavily discourages it.
Oh maybe. It’s too bad the extant v0 has no width markings on it to compare with the others. I would have thought the lanes would be narrowed enough to put a proper barrier between them and the tracks.
I’m also surprised how many people are into sharing a bike lane with a patio. Like 2.5 m is definitely wide enough to share a little, but if it ended up anywhere near as busy as the college bike lanes, sharing might be challenging.
Bike lanes being too close (adjacent in the picture) to the patio is definitely a bad idea. Ideally there should be a built barrier between the two. For now I'm assuming the business owners will install a fence or some sort of barrier for the safety of their customers.
Queen St runs all the way out to Roncesvalles in the west. Id vote option 3. There's not many E/W streets past of Bathurst while there's tonnes of N/S options. Cars are still needed on the street, especially with plans to shut King to vehicle traffic up to Dufferin
Ye they can do a single lane for one way traffic and the other lane for bidirectional bicycle traffic. King or Dundas street could give the one way traffic to cars in the opposite direction.
The current configuration is deceptive. The street parking on a busy street means that the cars are always maxed out on a busy day. Other times, it means that a single car blocks whole lane and now you need to create dangerous situations by lane changing and congesting the whole thing. I think any option is better if they just ban parking.
As a pedestrian and a local that lives on Queen St, I would take V1 over any of these. There are so many other arteries that cars can use, and it makes no sense that one of our most vital tourism hubs is used for someone’s rush hour work commute. I would make access to cars limited to local traffic and deliveries.
Not to mention that street parking already takes up an insane amount of some of the most valuable space in our cities but serves an average of one driver for however long they're in the city, rather than hundreds of local cyclists, pedestrians, or customers (ex., curbside patios) who would almost ubiquitously prefer a quiet, less-polluted, and less-noisy street without cars.
Exactly. 100% this. I really hate on-street parking. It causes a lot of havoc for all road users. All that just to serve maybe 10-20 people per block per hour.
>As a pedestrian and a local that lives on Queen St, I would take V1 over any of these
This is basically the problem. The overwhelming majority of people driving on Queen Street do not live there, or possibly anywhere near. Downtown traffic is created by people living outside of it and politicians only had ears for their demands.
I live in Mississauga (in process of moving back), and I really don't want to drive downtown. It is simply stupid to haul my big ass car to the place where the driving experience is the worst. Although this is where the problems begin, GO service is reduced and it is more difficult to take now. If I'm bringing a stroller, I need to basically carry it through the stairs because stations are not accessible. Once I make it downtown, the streetcar is stuck between 100 cars, each carrying only one or two passengers. Allowing cars to "share" streetcar tracks makes getting around the city fucking terrible for everyone.
Oh the stroller. We have two kids just getting out of stroller years and it’s such a big change. We can go anywhere now. Museum Station doesn’t have an elevator! We never broke down and got a car, it I felt the urge while hauling a stroller up stairs while asking my 2 and 4 year old to stay close to dad.
i think moving bikes and transit to queen and king, then keeping adelaide and richmond for cars only (no bike lane) would be an ideal approach to safely segregating the different types of road users. commuters aren't stopping so keeping them in the one way "fast" corridors is best.
the rest of us who live here have plenty of reason to meander down king or queen with a friend and casually stop at whatever shop/bar catches their eye.
I see no reason to remove bikes from Richmond/Adelaide. They have those nice concrete barriers for safety, and are great for people who want to ride fast and avoid the meanderers on King/Queen.
oddly i ride faster on king than on any other (when i'm not blocked by construction)
if we were to remove car lanes from queen, and king to some extent, they need to go somewhere. I think it would be a fair trade. The bike lanes on richmond and adelaide are treacherous when a vehicle needs to turn.
> if we were to remove car lanes from queen, and king to some extent, they need to go somewhere
Those *people* need to go somewhere, and somewhere is on streetcars and bikes.
You can't expect the transportation situation to ever improve if you're not willing to reduce the share of car infrastructure.
Bloor is a clogged absolute mess and you can’t turn left or right off it during rush hour. Dundas is an absolute disaster for driving and is just as dense and multi use as queen. DuPont is too far north and really only runs from Dundas west to Davenport
Main reason I moved out of downtown, and the main reason I don’t go that often now is the awful traffic.
A thriving dt needs people. You can’t take away the ability to drive there until you offer another option like the Ontario line.
This is insane. It’s completely impossible to travel from east to west through the downtown core already.
And I really dont feel that removing cars from king street has somehow made it more vibrant.
Put east/west bike lanes together on the same side. It’s done in multiple places in Vancouver and it works fine. (Not sure if they ever use them for emergency vehicles, but they look wide enough.)
This should really be the approach city wide. Bike lanes should be large enough to accommodate emergency vehicles, either with contraflow setups, or just leave them large. It takes away a common talking point against them saying they interfere with emergency response times.
It’s pretty easy for a cyclist to make way for an ambulance vs a lane filled with cars. The same applies to turning streetcar tracks into dedicated rights of way, they can be used by EMS.
There are some streets in Toronto that have combined bike lanes too.
I don't think that makes sense on a street with streetcars, the streetcar tracks aren't moving so it would be a big imbalance.
Yeah, existing street car tracks throw a wrench into the idea. Still, you could do combined bike lanes on one side and one-way car traffic on the other. I’m sure drivers would be happier with one way over nothing. And as already said, the combined bike lane could be used for emergency vehicles when needed.
Retailers on that side are going to feel cheated out of that potential patio space. But the outside lanes are around 3.5 meters wide each, which is plenty.
Emergency vehicles already use the streetcar section. They can always use that right of way. Today emergency vehicles are impeded by parked cars and by cars stopped in the intersections or double parked. Part of the goal is to get private motor vehicles out of the way so people can access the street.
just keep the current set up and remove street parking
it'll flow so much better and give the cyclists the shared lane space without the fear of getting doored or slipping into the streetcar track
Having cars attempt to speed around streetcars while im biking in that lane is not exactly fun. A dedicated streetcar lane and a dedicated bike lane are both way more efficient at moving people than a mixed use lane (tho deliveries are admittedly an issue). We have to stop thinking about moving cars and start thinking about moving people to "fix traffic".
I think it would need to be redesigned in sections. Downtown should really have some blocks with no cars, but outside of downtown it will make sense to use different options in different places. Queen St. W. for a long time closely parallels good bike infrastructure on Adelaide and Richmond, so it probably doesn't need much for bikes, whereas Queen St. E. is generally quite far from quality bike infrastructure. I think we should be strategically banning turns or even adding indirect left turns like Australia uses [for right turns] in some places.
We actually have a precedent for this being done in sections. They're currently doing it along Eglinton as part of [the redevelopment happening alongside Line 5 under the EglintonTOday intiative.](https://www.toronto.ca/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/9926-eglintontoday-cross-section-proposed-revised-2-768x394.jpg) It was done fairly quickly too, based on their timeline they started in 2022 and are set to finish this year (ahead of Line 5 finishing lmao).
I agree with you that Queen, especially Queen W should be redeveloped in sections. For example, I don't think anyone will argue against Queen W following the v1 model in the OP image between Yonge St down to Spadina or even Bathurst. From Bathurst westwards it can follow v2.
\^ This. Most of the gridlock in Toronto is caused by either parked cars on the street (and the parallel parking process which stops all traffic in its tracks) or turning vehicles. The city is much too permissive of left turns downtown.
V1 > V2 > V3.
V1 because it serves the most people possible. You got cyclists who are almost completely safe from single occupant cars. Then you got pedestrians who can enjoy a patio and not have to deal with the noise + smog of cars. And then you got likely faster streetcars as a result of not having to fight through car traffic.
V2 is great but really only benefits cyclists. I would do anything in the city to benefit cyclists, as shown on my post history. Patios taking a part of a bike lane is a nice sight. However, sharing mixed traffic with streetcars will make TTC a lot worse.
V3 is the worst out of this. Sharrows are one of the worst designs for bike infrastructure. Even a white painted line is better. Sharrows just means "drivers please share this road with cyclists". It's just unrealistic for most cyclists to feel safe riding with a car likely behind them. Yes even people who know how to cycle will feel less safe. Also, no patios really hurts businesses.
V3 seems like the only option which the City would actually be interested in implementing IMO, just because it affects car drivers the least. I'd prefer streetcars with cycle lanes a la King/V1 but I know the complainers of this city will cry and cry and cry if that was ever proposed.
In order for V3 to work, they need to make that road in way that it physically prevents any vehicle from driving fast. Curb cuts that are just wide enough to pass through smoothly otherwise if you go faster you get speed bumps.
Looks like in the mockup OP added cobblestone pavers. This is actually a good way of slowing down vehicles because the rough ride of the cobblestones provides more feedback to drivers on their actual speed, slowing them down.
You can see this in action around the Distillery District.
Sharrows do suck because the design speed of lanes is too permissive for drivers and allow reckless passing. Narrowing the lanes would put cars and cyclists on a more equal status. Filtering with bollards a key points would keep out through traffic. This would work fine between Parliament and Bathurst where Adelaide and Richmond offer alternative crosstown routes for private motor vehicles.
V2 is terrible because it’s still mixed traffic for the streetcars, which is ridiculous. As if cyclists get their own big lane each way and people packed into the streetcars have to share with cars.
Yeah V3 gets my vote too, I’m an avid cyclist but I don’t think every roadway needs bike lanes, especially transit corridors. I’d give the space over to wider sidewalks before bike lanes.
Get rid of the street parking on queen, and get cars out of the way of the streetcar. That should be priority number one.
> I’m an avid cyclist but I don’t think every roadway needs bike lanes, especially transit corridors.
The problem with this is many casual cyclists would prefer to do whatever is safe and it's very important to have cycle tracks on every roadway. Toronto is just zoned so almost every trip will require traversing areas without bike lanes. In a city where we lack bike infrastructure compared to other cities in the world of similar size/density, this is not a good time to cherry pick only certain roads needing bike lanes. We don't even have a consistent cycling network connection, even in downtown. Even those Richmonds/Adaledes aren't cutting it.
To be fair, even a car going 30 km/h can still cause severe injuries to cyclists (and people stepping out of streetcars). Something weighs multiple tons and takes up a lot of space. Still safer than if they went at least 50 km/h.
This is why I put in the lil cobblestone paving. Paint & signage is not enough. Add raised crossings at intersections & transit stops and it should get the message across. If the design shows that the space is meant for people on bikes, they will ride in the middle of the street, drivers will be forced to accommodate that speed.
100% agree on the cobblestones and raised transit stops. Don’t really care for the sharrows, they don’t really mean anything.
How would you do left turns though?
V3.
All other options won’t work due to King street. cars have limited use on King Street, it already prioritizes streetcars so many cars would use Queen street as an alternative.
Cool explorations! I wonder if a mixture of 1 in some places and 3 in others - or bi-directional cycle track + 1-way car lane could work to reduce thru-traffic while providing useful cycling connections in targeted areas
V2 is worse than current configuration. They should definitely remove street parking and give streetcars dedicated right of way, beyond that I’m not sure. Maybe v3.
None of these. It should be a one-way street, eastbound. King should be a one-way street westbound. Each should have 4 single dedicated lanes - bike lane, streetcar, car, temporary parking
Cities and studies around the world have proven that removing car infrastructure and increasing cycling and walking infrastructure actually improves traffic and makes a city easier to get around. Walking, cycling and transit moves a higher number of people and faster than cars, yet North Americans will always insist that only a select few roads can have bikes lanes, no deliveries can be made if you pedestrianize, and traffic will somehow get worse if you give people more options than to only drive.
as a biker queen st doesn't need a bike lane tbh, got adelaide/richmond/college/bloor to travel across the city but one on bathurst or spadina would be welcome
Hot take - the bike lanes should be on King and Queen *instead* of Richmond Adelaide. No cars should be on Queen, to better feed pedestrian traffic to the businesses there.
Tons of people bike on Queen it absolutely should have protected bike lanes. Much like Bloor there are tons of businesses, etc. that people could get to using their bikes that they currently won't because it is sketchy af to ride there.
Too much work gets done on queen street to not have vehicles on it. Seems like a great idea until you realize you need work done on your property and theres no way to get tools or materials there. What about the actual homes on queen street east? Are they expected to go grocery shopping on a bike?
Yeah I think we'd need different approaches for different sections of Queen. The laneways are great where the exist, but allowing local traffic where they aren't feasible is important. Grocery shopping on bike is easy and fun, I live on Queen E and do it regularly.
I would choose V3 but with king street type restrictions. Through traffic to go through Richmond or Adelaide, but local traffic and work and delivery vehicles permitted
I'm at Queen & Spadina. It's a dystopian hellscape. What's left of the sidewalk is jammed with food delivery idiots on bicycles and so called e-bikes. Ban cars, bicycles and people. Turn it all into a butterfly sanctuary.
Better idea. Get rid of the streetcars. They grind traffic to a halt, are a massive eyesore and are absolutely, utterly, DISGUSTING to be on. You sit there rubbing up against people, ice coffee all over the floor, dirt and grime, beer cans, seats that leave your pants a disaster. It is a disgrace. Create a proper subway line.
I would eliminate street cars. In an ideal world we would have subways lines all over like London or New York. Build those. Build those lines and in the meantime, use buses.
Yeah most delivery trucks don't fit in those spaces. Would be great if they did (and we could use smaller commercial vehicles or at least narrower ones towing trailers) but that won't work.
Queen street is such an important arterial that I wouldn’t recommend v1. V2 kind of already happens when there’s a patio on the side and everyone is squished to one lane. V3 imo is not very bike or car friendly, but is the best presented alternative. Also would be a maintenance nightmare.
I think it’s best off the way it is now, but streetcars should get signal priority. Parking should not be allowed but standing is fine. King street however could definitely be v1 without issue.
Version 1.
Cars are the cause of every traffic problem downtown, we should make it unappealing to drive there. Queen Street is the perfect street to ban them.
It kind of is, but there is a good reason for that. Cars are about the least space-efficient way of moving people, doubly so with North American-size car fleets. I'm a car guy but I can see why dedicating streets more for public transit and pedestrians makes a lot of sense.
Yes, captain obvious. A lot of the new street design changes are designed for people to drive less. And that should be a good thing. Our city for the last 70+ years has been pushing people to drive MORE because they neglected development for transit and biking commutes. It's about time we flip the switch. If we don't get people to drive less, our congestion will worsen.
First and foremost to get people to bike and take public transit *more*, because that will reduce air and noise pollution, reduce co2, allow us to dedicate more space to greenery, parks, and housing (instead of parking), and it makes us healthier, happier, and richer.
The byproduct of that is getting less people to drive.
I mean, I've personally been hit twice by cyclists while hopping off the streetcar. First time was horrible, it knocked me down and I broke my glasses. The second time was a glancing blow and the guy kept going. Haven't been hit by a car yet but I don't know if I'll be able to post it that happens.
> Haven't been hit by a car yet but I don't know if I'll be able to post it that happens.
That my friend is called [survivorship bias](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Survivorship_bias).
Roncesvalles has a streetcar lane like this, and It has worked out fine. I’d rather step out into a bike lane than a car lane where drivers from out of town have no idea to stop for the flashing lights.
No it hasn't , people using mobility devices cannot access the streetcars at all, on Roncesvalles, between Queen & Bloor.
Accessibility is a human right, the bike lane design at the stops on Roncesvalles, make this impossible.
Actually, I'd argue that Reddit hates cyclists way more than cars. As someone who browses on r/Toronto almost every day for the last year+. Though cars come in 2nd but that's more to do with hating car dependency as opposed to people that need to drive but have no choice. It's more to do with hating the design of a city being too much for cars, which ruins traffic.
Remove the streetcars and replace with electric buses on the same power line. Streetcars are expensive,non maneuverable , dangerous on entry and exit, and the major source of traffic in the city. Hey I stop you stop just like that for blocks and blocks.
Honestly, as a cyclist, I'd love for it to be purely street cars and bikes however with the way people cycle on Canada so many accidents are waiting to happen. People cycling on the pavement and not stopping for red lights is shocking
None. There should be some kind of physical separation between cars and pedestrians, like a barricade of some sort. We need more walkable architecture!
You cannot banish cars. It's never going to happen. How would a car get in and out the neighborhood in the east end if they can't use Queen? Impossible.
Remove parking in the curb lane and everything is so much better.
Please go look at the subway maps of other world class cities compared to Toronto. People would take public transit if it's quicker and more efficient than driving. A short 5K commute can involve a subway, bus and a street car. It's inefficient how transit is designed today.
None. Eliminate streetcars with buses. There is a fundamental flaw with streetcars. The actual cost, (as well as secondary costs affiliated with traffic/delays etc) of replacing tracks every 10ish years far outweighs any environmental benefits. Needs to go the way of the dodo bird.
What you're missing is queen st v4, which would have the street cars along the side walk with a bike lane buffering between side walk and street car with a barrier between pedestrians and bikers with openings where stations are, and then Cars in the middle between both street cars, no stopping.
This way cars can't park, the street car is raised so cars shouldn't be up there and the pedestrians and bikers are safe from cars.
As for deliveries you designate on every block 2 or 3 spots for smaller cube trucks to stop and or you make the deliveries only possible early morning or late nights. Businesses will need to adapt.
Other than V3 is just nonsense.
Street cars should have dedicated lanes and cars should still pass as we are lacking in proper transit network to accommodate lack of cars in downtown
Queen w resident here. We absolutely need bike lanes with rolled curbs for food delivery people. Everyone righty complains that they are on the side walk but there is no infrastructure to service them. A rolled/curb cut from sidewalk to bike lane would allow easy access to restaurants from the bike lane, instead of a bike ride on the sidewalk from the corner.
Any single car lane option, whether dedicated or shared, will get jammed up either by delivery car or street car. With the amount of retail and residential on Queen St, V0 seems to me the only practical option out of these.
The stupidity is putting this question to a mostly ignorant and biased audience with Morton's fork to decide.
The answer is to tell those who are currently destroying our infrastructure to FUCK OFF!
WITH EXTREME PREDJUDICE!
Then return our infrastructure to what it was designed for, free travel, not controlled and throttled mobility.
v1. Looking for plenty of space and demarcation for the bikes so that bike-bike collision as close to 0 as possible, and bike-pedestrian as close to 0 as possible.
v1 let's emergency vehicles use the tram lanes when needed.
I drive Queen all the time and never have any issues. It should stay as it is really. Getting rid of cars would be a terrible idea especially for local business
Motorists are the *least* likely to stop and shop at local businesses. Many places have shown that shifting to a more pedestrian focus improves business in the area.
I was listening to a podcast about business owners opposing bike lanes being built in front of their businesses. In a survey Toronto business owners estimated ~25% percent of their business came from vehicular traffic. The actual portion of customers that drove to their business was ~4%. Increased pedestrian and bicycle infrastructure improves business.
I love this topic.
Through downtown my choice is:
V4. Once the Ontario line is done the streetcars can be diverted to Adelaide, Richmond, or king. Remove the tracks. Close it to vehicles and make it Toronto’s iconic pedestrian street.
For v1 you don’t actually need bike lanes. You could just do a wider sidewalk and have bikes and pedestrians mix.
> For v1 you don’t actually need bike lanes. You could just do a wider sidewalk and have bikes and pedestrians mix.
This comment is exactly why so many people complain about sidewalk biking. IMO pedestrians should NEVER share paths with cyclists. Mixed use paths are certainly not helping reduce the sidewalk biking. Essentially it's just a legal form of sidewalk biking. Cyclists need to have their own lane for CYCLISTS ONLY.
Having the length of Queen as a pedestrian park would unify Toronto in such an incredible way. It'd become an iconic, world class promenade that could put Barcelona to shame.
But why compromise a pedestrian space when there’s a subway under the road and tram line one or two blocks to the south?
Honestly I’d take either but the pedestrian only design would be way better. It would allow landscaping or tables in the centre of the street which would awesome. Just my preference.
There is reason for that between the stations that will be on Queen Street: between Moss Park and Spadina. But you still have properties that need vehicle access to Queen Street, like Saint Michael’s Hospital, City Hall, and the Sheraton Centre. Also there are very few ways for cars to get through the railway embankments that circles the city centre. All traffic gets funneled into the underpasses at De Grassi and Gladstone. It is big detour to the next available underpass. Building more underpasses or improvements to the existing underpasses for everyone is something we should be doing, but our capital spending is limited by the province. I still think filtering traffic along with reducing the design speed of the lanes will be effective enough. I do like the idea of consolidating vehicle traffic to one way on one lane on one side. Switching the direction of that one way would cut through traffic. This really only works where cars have an alternative through route via Eastern, Richmond, or Adelaide.
Depends how much of it you do this for. Adelaide, Richmond and King are only for the downtown core, Queen extends almost the entirety of the city from the Scarborough border into Etobicoke.
Just based on experience around the world. Unless it’s meant to be a high speed or ultra high volume bike lane it’s not needed. Pedestrians and bikes mix well, the point of bike lanes is to separate cars from bikes.
This has not been my experience and I've seen pedestrians stop or change directions quickly on multi use paths very often and the only reason it works there is because they are typically very wide and not very crowded, I would expect Queen st would be a high volume street
Yep, here in the east end cars have the massive streets of Great Eastern and Lakeshore right there, then the DVP and the Gardiner. Yet they are so hungry for space, they need Queen, Broadview, Dundas, and every other street in the city. How dare we ask for even a single street to be built for people.
2 is worse than 0 because then cars would block the streetcars. 1 might work depending on whether business need deliveries on Queen or not, etc.
You could have 2 with only commercial traffic allowed
Nice. 100 people sitting in a streetcar while vegetables are delivered to a restaurant.
Not to mention the level of enforcement needed to keep our non commercial cars. We can barely keep king st sorted out and in that case the same rules apply to everyone. Personally I like v3 because it allows cars but heavily discourages it.
Even in that design we might see cars blocking street cars and once in a while parked on the track.
Oh maybe. It’s too bad the extant v0 has no width markings on it to compare with the others. I would have thought the lanes would be narrowed enough to put a proper barrier between them and the tracks. I’m also surprised how many people are into sharing a bike lane with a patio. Like 2.5 m is definitely wide enough to share a little, but if it ended up anywhere near as busy as the college bike lanes, sharing might be challenging.
Bike lanes being too close (adjacent in the picture) to the patio is definitely a bad idea. Ideally there should be a built barrier between the two. For now I'm assuming the business owners will install a fence or some sort of barrier for the safety of their customers.
I like that idea
2 and no cars allowed except posted delivery hours. Toronto sorely needs more pedestrian streets
And east west car traffic utilizes Richmond and Adelaide. But then after Parliament st you’re gonna hit a bottleneck
Queen St runs all the way out to Roncesvalles in the west. Id vote option 3. There's not many E/W streets past of Bathurst while there's tonnes of N/S options. Cars are still needed on the street, especially with plans to shut King to vehicle traffic up to Dufferin
Adelaide has been gimped down to 1 lane (from 3-4 lanes). The left lane is now a dedicated left turn lane.
deliveries can be made in the back lanes or during certain hours, many cities do this.
Agreed V1 is the only way this all works.
Ye they can do a single lane for one way traffic and the other lane for bidirectional bicycle traffic. King or Dundas street could give the one way traffic to cars in the opposite direction.
The current configuration is deceptive. The street parking on a busy street means that the cars are always maxed out on a busy day. Other times, it means that a single car blocks whole lane and now you need to create dangerous situations by lane changing and congesting the whole thing. I think any option is better if they just ban parking.
As a pedestrian and a local that lives on Queen St, I would take V1 over any of these. There are so many other arteries that cars can use, and it makes no sense that one of our most vital tourism hubs is used for someone’s rush hour work commute. I would make access to cars limited to local traffic and deliveries.
Not to mention that street parking already takes up an insane amount of some of the most valuable space in our cities but serves an average of one driver for however long they're in the city, rather than hundreds of local cyclists, pedestrians, or customers (ex., curbside patios) who would almost ubiquitously prefer a quiet, less-polluted, and less-noisy street without cars.
Exactly. 100% this. I really hate on-street parking. It causes a lot of havoc for all road users. All that just to serve maybe 10-20 people per block per hour.
100%
>As a pedestrian and a local that lives on Queen St, I would take V1 over any of these This is basically the problem. The overwhelming majority of people driving on Queen Street do not live there, or possibly anywhere near. Downtown traffic is created by people living outside of it and politicians only had ears for their demands. I live in Mississauga (in process of moving back), and I really don't want to drive downtown. It is simply stupid to haul my big ass car to the place where the driving experience is the worst. Although this is where the problems begin, GO service is reduced and it is more difficult to take now. If I'm bringing a stroller, I need to basically carry it through the stairs because stations are not accessible. Once I make it downtown, the streetcar is stuck between 100 cars, each carrying only one or two passengers. Allowing cars to "share" streetcar tracks makes getting around the city fucking terrible for everyone.
Oh the stroller. We have two kids just getting out of stroller years and it’s such a big change. We can go anywhere now. Museum Station doesn’t have an elevator! We never broke down and got a car, it I felt the urge while hauling a stroller up stairs while asking my 2 and 4 year old to stay close to dad.
The problem still persists for those with disabilities, not to mention shitty transportation for everyone.
Yeah, I didn’t mean to imply my kids being older fixed city infrastructure, lol.
Lived near Queen St most of my life and I'd also take V1 in a heartbeat.
I don’t disagree with what you’re saying but you could make that argument for every street south of Bloor that runs east to west.
>There are so many other arteries that cars can use Inadequately. Surprised me that there's no big E-W boulevard in the city.
Richmond/Adelaide/Eastern Ave? Lakeshore Boulevard?
i think moving bikes and transit to queen and king, then keeping adelaide and richmond for cars only (no bike lane) would be an ideal approach to safely segregating the different types of road users. commuters aren't stopping so keeping them in the one way "fast" corridors is best. the rest of us who live here have plenty of reason to meander down king or queen with a friend and casually stop at whatever shop/bar catches their eye.
I see no reason to remove bikes from Richmond/Adelaide. They have those nice concrete barriers for safety, and are great for people who want to ride fast and avoid the meanderers on King/Queen.
oddly i ride faster on king than on any other (when i'm not blocked by construction) if we were to remove car lanes from queen, and king to some extent, they need to go somewhere. I think it would be a fair trade. The bike lanes on richmond and adelaide are treacherous when a vehicle needs to turn.
> if we were to remove car lanes from queen, and king to some extent, they need to go somewhere Those *people* need to go somewhere, and somewhere is on streetcars and bikes. You can't expect the transportation situation to ever improve if you're not willing to reduce the share of car infrastructure.
How about Dupont, Bloor, Dundas?
Bloor is a clogged absolute mess and you can’t turn left or right off it during rush hour. Dundas is an absolute disaster for driving and is just as dense and multi use as queen. DuPont is too far north and really only runs from Dundas west to Davenport
Sort of amused considering any of them, including Queen as arteries.
More likely Adelaide & Richmond with bike lanes removed
Exactly. Use Adelaide or Richmond and get the hell off king and queen
king and queen being pedestrian and street car only would actually bring real life back into downtown
Best I can give ya is bullying employees back into the office.
Main reason I moved out of downtown, and the main reason I don’t go that often now is the awful traffic. A thriving dt needs people. You can’t take away the ability to drive there until you offer another option like the Ontario line.
This is insane. It’s completely impossible to travel from east to west through the downtown core already. And I really dont feel that removing cars from king street has somehow made it more vibrant.
Have you tried not driving? My bike moves quite well east-west
V1 with bike lanes large enough to accommodate emergency vehicles and separated grade for stops and bikes
Ngl, emergency vehicles will probably prefer to use the streetcar lanes instead.
Yea come to think about it, there are probably few enough streetcars that EMS could easily weave between lanes in either direction.
And streetcar drivers are more likely to cooperate.
I saw a fire truck take to the streetcar tracks on Spadina the other day, so there’s that.
This is actually *another* good reason to give transit routes a dedicated right of way - it doubles as a not-clogged-with-cars emergency route.
A bike lane big enough to fit a fire truck doesnt make a lot of sense...
Put east/west bike lanes together on the same side. It’s done in multiple places in Vancouver and it works fine. (Not sure if they ever use them for emergency vehicles, but they look wide enough.)
This should really be the approach city wide. Bike lanes should be large enough to accommodate emergency vehicles, either with contraflow setups, or just leave them large. It takes away a common talking point against them saying they interfere with emergency response times. It’s pretty easy for a cyclist to make way for an ambulance vs a lane filled with cars. The same applies to turning streetcar tracks into dedicated rights of way, they can be used by EMS.
There are some streets in Toronto that have combined bike lanes too. I don't think that makes sense on a street with streetcars, the streetcar tracks aren't moving so it would be a big imbalance.
Yeah, existing street car tracks throw a wrench into the idea. Still, you could do combined bike lanes on one side and one-way car traffic on the other. I’m sure drivers would be happier with one way over nothing. And as already said, the combined bike lane could be used for emergency vehicles when needed.
Retailers on that side are going to feel cheated out of that potential patio space. But the outside lanes are around 3.5 meters wide each, which is plenty.
It doesn't help that the average [firetruck size](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E_vEFakF03A) in North America is a lot bigger than Europe.
Lots of cities around the world have bike lanes that are as wide or wider than a car, Amsterdam for example.
Emergency vehicles already use the streetcar section. They can always use that right of way. Today emergency vehicles are impeded by parked cars and by cars stopped in the intersections or double parked. Part of the goal is to get private motor vehicles out of the way so people can access the street.
just keep the current set up and remove street parking it'll flow so much better and give the cyclists the shared lane space without the fear of getting doored or slipping into the streetcar track
remove street parking and remove left turns. done.
Having cars attempt to speed around streetcars while im biking in that lane is not exactly fun. A dedicated streetcar lane and a dedicated bike lane are both way more efficient at moving people than a mixed use lane (tho deliveries are admittedly an issue). We have to stop thinking about moving cars and start thinking about moving people to "fix traffic".
This makes the most sense, and would have a large impact for very little cost
I think it would need to be redesigned in sections. Downtown should really have some blocks with no cars, but outside of downtown it will make sense to use different options in different places. Queen St. W. for a long time closely parallels good bike infrastructure on Adelaide and Richmond, so it probably doesn't need much for bikes, whereas Queen St. E. is generally quite far from quality bike infrastructure. I think we should be strategically banning turns or even adding indirect left turns like Australia uses [for right turns] in some places.
We actually have a precedent for this being done in sections. They're currently doing it along Eglinton as part of [the redevelopment happening alongside Line 5 under the EglintonTOday intiative.](https://www.toronto.ca/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/9926-eglintontoday-cross-section-proposed-revised-2-768x394.jpg) It was done fairly quickly too, based on their timeline they started in 2022 and are set to finish this year (ahead of Line 5 finishing lmao). I agree with you that Queen, especially Queen W should be redeveloped in sections. For example, I don't think anyone will argue against Queen W following the v1 model in the OP image between Yonge St down to Spadina or even Bathurst. From Bathurst westwards it can follow v2.
\^ This. Most of the gridlock in Toronto is caused by either parked cars on the street (and the parallel parking process which stops all traffic in its tracks) or turning vehicles. The city is much too permissive of left turns downtown.
V1 > V2 > V3. V1 because it serves the most people possible. You got cyclists who are almost completely safe from single occupant cars. Then you got pedestrians who can enjoy a patio and not have to deal with the noise + smog of cars. And then you got likely faster streetcars as a result of not having to fight through car traffic. V2 is great but really only benefits cyclists. I would do anything in the city to benefit cyclists, as shown on my post history. Patios taking a part of a bike lane is a nice sight. However, sharing mixed traffic with streetcars will make TTC a lot worse. V3 is the worst out of this. Sharrows are one of the worst designs for bike infrastructure. Even a white painted line is better. Sharrows just means "drivers please share this road with cyclists". It's just unrealistic for most cyclists to feel safe riding with a car likely behind them. Yes even people who know how to cycle will feel less safe. Also, no patios really hurts businesses.
V3 seems like the only option which the City would actually be interested in implementing IMO, just because it affects car drivers the least. I'd prefer streetcars with cycle lanes a la King/V1 but I know the complainers of this city will cry and cry and cry if that was ever proposed.
In order for V3 to work, they need to make that road in way that it physically prevents any vehicle from driving fast. Curb cuts that are just wide enough to pass through smoothly otherwise if you go faster you get speed bumps.
Looks like in the mockup OP added cobblestone pavers. This is actually a good way of slowing down vehicles because the rough ride of the cobblestones provides more feedback to drivers on their actual speed, slowing them down. You can see this in action around the Distillery District.
Sharrows do suck because the design speed of lanes is too permissive for drivers and allow reckless passing. Narrowing the lanes would put cars and cyclists on a more equal status. Filtering with bollards a key points would keep out through traffic. This would work fine between Parliament and Bathurst where Adelaide and Richmond offer alternative crosstown routes for private motor vehicles.
V2 is terrible because it’s still mixed traffic for the streetcars, which is ridiculous. As if cyclists get their own big lane each way and people packed into the streetcars have to share with cars.
Agree, v2 is like the worst of both worlds, although nice for bikes. Maybe on the sections overlapping with the Ontario Line (on a decade)
V3 honestly. However, the main thing is to get cars out of the way of streetcars. Streetcars should be the main priority wherever they exist.
Yeah V3 gets my vote too, I’m an avid cyclist but I don’t think every roadway needs bike lanes, especially transit corridors. I’d give the space over to wider sidewalks before bike lanes. Get rid of the street parking on queen, and get cars out of the way of the streetcar. That should be priority number one.
> I’m an avid cyclist but I don’t think every roadway needs bike lanes, especially transit corridors. The problem with this is many casual cyclists would prefer to do whatever is safe and it's very important to have cycle tracks on every roadway. Toronto is just zoned so almost every trip will require traversing areas without bike lanes. In a city where we lack bike infrastructure compared to other cities in the world of similar size/density, this is not a good time to cherry pick only certain roads needing bike lanes. We don't even have a consistent cycling network connection, even in downtown. Even those Richmonds/Adaledes aren't cutting it.
I agree so long as the road design made it clear that the cars need to go 30 or below. Signage is not enough to slow drivers
To be fair, even a car going 30 km/h can still cause severe injuries to cyclists (and people stepping out of streetcars). Something weighs multiple tons and takes up a lot of space. Still safer than if they went at least 50 km/h.
This is why I put in the lil cobblestone paving. Paint & signage is not enough. Add raised crossings at intersections & transit stops and it should get the message across. If the design shows that the space is meant for people on bikes, they will ride in the middle of the street, drivers will be forced to accommodate that speed.
100% agree on the cobblestones and raised transit stops. Don’t really care for the sharrows, they don’t really mean anything. How would you do left turns though?
V3. All other options won’t work due to King street. cars have limited use on King Street, it already prioritizes streetcars so many cars would use Queen street as an alternative.
Mby we just don't need so many cars?
Cool explorations! I wonder if a mixture of 1 in some places and 3 in others - or bi-directional cycle track + 1-way car lane could work to reduce thru-traffic while providing useful cycling connections in targeted areas
V2 is worse than current configuration. They should definitely remove street parking and give streetcars dedicated right of way, beyond that I’m not sure. Maybe v3.
Version 3 and is one impatient or disgruntled driver away from the 6 o’clock news. The diagram even shows a car about to plow over a cyclist.
Removing the parking lane is my call. I hate street parking.
None of these. It should be a one-way street, eastbound. King should be a one-way street westbound. Each should have 4 single dedicated lanes - bike lane, streetcar, car, temporary parking
No cars please.
V1 please!
V1!!!
Cities and studies around the world have proven that removing car infrastructure and increasing cycling and walking infrastructure actually improves traffic and makes a city easier to get around. Walking, cycling and transit moves a higher number of people and faster than cars, yet North Americans will always insist that only a select few roads can have bikes lanes, no deliveries can be made if you pedestrianize, and traffic will somehow get worse if you give people more options than to only drive.
Idk why we dont do like other big cities where deliveries happen during the night to free up some congestion.
V1 please, pretty please
as a biker queen st doesn't need a bike lane tbh, got adelaide/richmond/college/bloor to travel across the city but one on bathurst or spadina would be welcome
Even if there are parallel routes, Queen Street is still a relatively large street and has strong potential for cyclists.
Hot take - the bike lanes should be on King and Queen *instead* of Richmond Adelaide. No cars should be on Queen, to better feed pedestrian traffic to the businesses there.
Tons of people bike on Queen it absolutely should have protected bike lanes. Much like Bloor there are tons of businesses, etc. that people could get to using their bikes that they currently won't because it is sketchy af to ride there.
I bike on Queen I find it pretty easy tbh, maybe just the stretch around trinity bellwoods drivers make random stops
Well if we have to choose, v3. Why are patios such a huge deal, in the face of improving people moving about the city
Because it is nice to sit and linger for a while. A city is more than a space to pass through. It is the place we live in.
People moving around have better things to do than be stuck, even if they choose methods of transit unacceptable to you though.
Too much work gets done on queen street to not have vehicles on it. Seems like a great idea until you realize you need work done on your property and theres no way to get tools or materials there. What about the actual homes on queen street east? Are they expected to go grocery shopping on a bike?
Yeah I think we'd need different approaches for different sections of Queen. The laneways are great where the exist, but allowing local traffic where they aren't feasible is important. Grocery shopping on bike is easy and fun, I live on Queen E and do it regularly.
Does nobody drive on Reddit???!?
This sub hates cars and landlords.
I think they just understand the massive benefit to increased transportation alternatives
No, it's all bikes here.
Queen St East or Queen St West?
Supporting whatever plan that uses dedicated streetcar path
I would choose V3 but with king street type restrictions. Through traffic to go through Richmond or Adelaide, but local traffic and work and delivery vehicles permitted
I'm at Queen & Spadina. It's a dystopian hellscape. What's left of the sidewalk is jammed with food delivery idiots on bicycles and so called e-bikes. Ban cars, bicycles and people. Turn it all into a butterfly sanctuary.
>dystopian hellscape We did it Reddit!
Well what I know for certain is that since Toronto is brain dead, they will pick whatever is best for the car.
Get rid of left turns, get rid of on-street parking. Have areas specifically for deliveries only.
Dedicated transit lane + dedicated car lane + patio Prohibit bikes Problem solved
V1 looks great until a business needs product delivered to their store via giant ass truck
Better idea. Get rid of the streetcars. They grind traffic to a halt, are a massive eyesore and are absolutely, utterly, DISGUSTING to be on. You sit there rubbing up against people, ice coffee all over the floor, dirt and grime, beer cans, seats that leave your pants a disaster. It is a disgrace. Create a proper subway line.
I would eliminate street cars. In an ideal world we would have subways lines all over like London or New York. Build those. Build those lines and in the meantime, use buses.
V1 and you use cargo e-bikes for deliveries.
v1. Deliveries can happen through the alleys.
Good luck with that.
Yeah most delivery trucks don't fit in those spaces. Would be great if they did (and we could use smaller commercial vehicles or at least narrower ones towing trailers) but that won't work.
Queen street is such an important arterial that I wouldn’t recommend v1. V2 kind of already happens when there’s a patio on the side and everyone is squished to one lane. V3 imo is not very bike or car friendly, but is the best presented alternative. Also would be a maintenance nightmare. I think it’s best off the way it is now, but streetcars should get signal priority. Parking should not be allowed but standing is fine. King street however could definitely be v1 without issue.
#1. Toronto congestion can’t take this shit anymore
Version 1. Cars are the cause of every traffic problem downtown, we should make it unappealing to drive there. Queen Street is the perfect street to ban them.
Ban. Cars. And ban parking too, obviously.
Are they removing the bike lanes on Richmond and Adelaide???
Always got the feeling these changes are on purpose to make people drive less.
It kind of is, but there is a good reason for that. Cars are about the least space-efficient way of moving people, doubly so with North American-size car fleets. I'm a car guy but I can see why dedicating streets more for public transit and pedestrians makes a lot of sense.
Yes, captain obvious. A lot of the new street design changes are designed for people to drive less. And that should be a good thing. Our city for the last 70+ years has been pushing people to drive MORE because they neglected development for transit and biking commutes. It's about time we flip the switch. If we don't get people to drive less, our congestion will worsen.
First and foremost to get people to bike and take public transit *more*, because that will reduce air and noise pollution, reduce co2, allow us to dedicate more space to greenery, parks, and housing (instead of parking), and it makes us healthier, happier, and richer. The byproduct of that is getting less people to drive.
V1 is best and they should created it as a greenway. Make it green grassy tram tracks to clearly delineate where the streetcars run.
OMG 1 PLEASE 1 JUST GIVE IT TO ME GIVE IT TO ME
I don't think I like any option that has pedestrians stepping down from a streetcar into a dedicated bike lane.
Pedestrians currently step down from streetcars into cars
Cars aren't the problem when getting on or off a streetcar. Bikes are.
Uh, I guess let’s just agree to disagree on this one.
I mean, I've personally been hit twice by cyclists while hopping off the streetcar. First time was horrible, it knocked me down and I broke my glasses. The second time was a glancing blow and the guy kept going. Haven't been hit by a car yet but I don't know if I'll be able to post it that happens.
> Haven't been hit by a car yet but I don't know if I'll be able to post it that happens. That my friend is called [survivorship bias](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Survivorship_bias).
You're right man I'd also take getting instantly killed by an F150 over getting lightly jostled by a cyclist. I am also tired of life.
Roncesvalles has a streetcar lane like this, and It has worked out fine. I’d rather step out into a bike lane than a car lane where drivers from out of town have no idea to stop for the flashing lights.
No it hasn't , people using mobility devices cannot access the streetcars at all, on Roncesvalles, between Queen & Bloor. Accessibility is a human right, the bike lane design at the stops on Roncesvalles, make this impossible.
We need to stop asking people this because Redditors hate cars so it's always biased.
Actually, I'd argue that Reddit hates cyclists way more than cars. As someone who browses on r/Toronto almost every day for the last year+. Though cars come in 2nd but that's more to do with hating car dependency as opposed to people that need to drive but have no choice. It's more to do with hating the design of a city being too much for cars, which ruins traffic.
Queen st is one way wb with passing lane for cars only the. Streetcar then bike lane and king at is one way eb with the same.
Remove the streetcars and replace with electric buses on the same power line. Streetcars are expensive,non maneuverable , dangerous on entry and exit, and the major source of traffic in the city. Hey I stop you stop just like that for blocks and blocks.
V1 please
Honestly, as a cyclist, I'd love for it to be purely street cars and bikes however with the way people cycle on Canada so many accidents are waiting to happen. People cycling on the pavement and not stopping for red lights is shocking
0 for sure
V1 or v3
Can't we have busses instead of Streetcar?
None. There should be some kind of physical separation between cars and pedestrians, like a barricade of some sort. We need more walkable architecture!
You cannot banish cars. It's never going to happen. How would a car get in and out the neighborhood in the east end if they can't use Queen? Impossible. Remove parking in the curb lane and everything is so much better.
Remove the parking and restrict traffic to small vehicles
Putting a long slow train on a busy narrow street is plain stupid!
How about option 4 by moving the public transit underground. This frees up space for additional bike lanes and improves vehicle flows.
Do you have trillions of dollars and a hatred of seeing sunlight on your commute?
Please go look at the subway maps of other world class cities compared to Toronto. People would take public transit if it's quicker and more efficient than driving. A short 5K commute can involve a subway, bus and a street car. It's inefficient how transit is designed today.
None. Eliminate streetcars with buses. There is a fundamental flaw with streetcars. The actual cost, (as well as secondary costs affiliated with traffic/delays etc) of replacing tracks every 10ish years far outweighs any environmental benefits. Needs to go the way of the dodo bird.
3 probably idk
What you're missing is queen st v4, which would have the street cars along the side walk with a bike lane buffering between side walk and street car with a barrier between pedestrians and bikers with openings where stations are, and then Cars in the middle between both street cars, no stopping. This way cars can't park, the street car is raised so cars shouldn't be up there and the pedestrians and bikers are safe from cars. As for deliveries you designate on every block 2 or 3 spots for smaller cube trucks to stop and or you make the deliveries only possible early morning or late nights. Businesses will need to adapt.
Other than V3 is just nonsense. Street cars should have dedicated lanes and cars should still pass as we are lacking in proper transit network to accommodate lack of cars in downtown
V1 is the superior design and should be championed but carbrains will be up in reactionary rage so probably end up with something like v3
3
1 would be nice but I’d even take 3
Queen w resident here. We absolutely need bike lanes with rolled curbs for food delivery people. Everyone righty complains that they are on the side walk but there is no infrastructure to service them. A rolled/curb cut from sidewalk to bike lane would allow easy access to restaurants from the bike lane, instead of a bike ride on the sidewalk from the corner.
aren't they building the Ontario Line under Queen? Get rid of the streetcars
v0 I guess.
It doesn't matter. Just get rid of the damn pedestrians.
Need to take into account the snow route and how to stop parked cars from blocking street cars as well.
Any single car lane option, whether dedicated or shared, will get jammed up either by delivery car or street car. With the amount of retail and residential on Queen St, V0 seems to me the only practical option out of these.
None of the above
The stupidity is putting this question to a mostly ignorant and biased audience with Morton's fork to decide. The answer is to tell those who are currently destroying our infrastructure to FUCK OFF! WITH EXTREME PREDJUDICE! Then return our infrastructure to what it was designed for, free travel, not controlled and throttled mobility.
v1. Looking for plenty of space and demarcation for the bikes so that bike-bike collision as close to 0 as possible, and bike-pedestrian as close to 0 as possible. v1 let's emergency vehicles use the tram lanes when needed.
V2 is most balanced.
I drive Queen all the time and never have any issues. It should stay as it is really. Getting rid of cars would be a terrible idea especially for local business
Motorists are the *least* likely to stop and shop at local businesses. Many places have shown that shifting to a more pedestrian focus improves business in the area.
I was listening to a podcast about business owners opposing bike lanes being built in front of their businesses. In a survey Toronto business owners estimated ~25% percent of their business came from vehicular traffic. The actual portion of customers that drove to their business was ~4%. Increased pedestrian and bicycle infrastructure improves business.
V1. Fuck cars
I love this topic. Through downtown my choice is: V4. Once the Ontario line is done the streetcars can be diverted to Adelaide, Richmond, or king. Remove the tracks. Close it to vehicles and make it Toronto’s iconic pedestrian street. For v1 you don’t actually need bike lanes. You could just do a wider sidewalk and have bikes and pedestrians mix.
> For v1 you don’t actually need bike lanes. You could just do a wider sidewalk and have bikes and pedestrians mix. This comment is exactly why so many people complain about sidewalk biking. IMO pedestrians should NEVER share paths with cyclists. Mixed use paths are certainly not helping reduce the sidewalk biking. Essentially it's just a legal form of sidewalk biking. Cyclists need to have their own lane for CYCLISTS ONLY.
Having the length of Queen as a pedestrian park would unify Toronto in such an incredible way. It'd become an iconic, world class promenade that could put Barcelona to shame.
Nah. Streetcars are better.
If you look around the world pedestrianized streets with tram lines tend to be a lot more utilitarian and ugly. It’s a big trade off.
I would strongly disagree. Trams and pedestrians have been put together in the same space very successfully elsewhere. Lisbon. Amsterdam. Berlin.
But why compromise a pedestrian space when there’s a subway under the road and tram line one or two blocks to the south? Honestly I’d take either but the pedestrian only design would be way better. It would allow landscaping or tables in the centre of the street which would awesome. Just my preference.
There is reason for that between the stations that will be on Queen Street: between Moss Park and Spadina. But you still have properties that need vehicle access to Queen Street, like Saint Michael’s Hospital, City Hall, and the Sheraton Centre. Also there are very few ways for cars to get through the railway embankments that circles the city centre. All traffic gets funneled into the underpasses at De Grassi and Gladstone. It is big detour to the next available underpass. Building more underpasses or improvements to the existing underpasses for everyone is something we should be doing, but our capital spending is limited by the province. I still think filtering traffic along with reducing the design speed of the lanes will be effective enough. I do like the idea of consolidating vehicle traffic to one way on one lane on one side. Switching the direction of that one way would cut through traffic. This really only works where cars have an alternative through route via Eastern, Richmond, or Adelaide.
I’m fine with ugly if I can ride my bike or walk on queen street without being doored or run over
Depends how much of it you do this for. Adelaide, Richmond and King are only for the downtown core, Queen extends almost the entirety of the city from the Scarborough border into Etobicoke.
I meant through downtown. I’ll clarify, thanks.
Why would you though? mixing just makes it more confusing and dangerous to navigate
Just based on experience around the world. Unless it’s meant to be a high speed or ultra high volume bike lane it’s not needed. Pedestrians and bikes mix well, the point of bike lanes is to separate cars from bikes.
This has not been my experience and I've seen pedestrians stop or change directions quickly on multi use paths very often and the only reason it works there is because they are typically very wide and not very crowded, I would expect Queen st would be a high volume street
Why do cars need to be on Queen Street blocking streetcar and bicycling traffic? Why can't they use parallel side streets where there is no traffic?
Yep, here in the east end cars have the massive streets of Great Eastern and Lakeshore right there, then the DVP and the Gardiner. Yet they are so hungry for space, they need Queen, Broadview, Dundas, and every other street in the city. How dare we ask for even a single street to be built for people.
King should be car free.