On September 24th, 2002 the City of Toronto will host a public meeting to gather input from the residents of the city on the new City of Toronto Official Plan. This meeting is required before City Council can vote to approve the plan. The meeting will be held at the City Council Chambers at 100 Queen Street West and will start at 9:30 am. There will be opportunities for residents of Toronto to speak at this meeting.

The Toronto Official Plan has been in the works for over three years and was released on May 27th, 2002. It is the first official plan for the Amalgamated City of Toronto and it lays out a vision for the development of the city for the next 30 years. It tries to lay out how Toronto will absorb its share(between 500,00 and one million people) of 2.6 million more people moving to the Greater Toronto Area in the next 30 years. It addresses the issues of land use, transportation, and implementation.

This plan should be of interest to those that want to increase the role of cycling as a transportation mode. There are sections of the Official Plan that deal with cycling in general and the Toronto Bike Plan in particular. To try and summarize the Plan in a short article would be impossible. Fortunately for those who are interested the plan is available on the City of Toronto's web site.

Cycling is most directly addressed in the section 2.4 entitled "Bringing the City Together: A Progressive Agenda of Transportation Change. You can download this Chapter as a PDF file Chapter 2(PDF). (This section is on page 26 of the PDF document.) This section also includes references to the Toronto Bike Plan. Having the Bike Plan highlighted in the Official Plan and having elements of it mentioned in various sections of the Official Plan will give ammunition to those residents who want to see the implementation of the Bike Plan continue as planned and not fall off the agenda.

There are also sections that have an indirect impact of cycling. In section 2.2.3 entitled "Toronto's Greenspace System and Waterfront" there are references to expanding, improving and linking the Green Space in Toronto. It also recommends improving public access to public and private green space areas. It does not specifically mention recreational paths as a means to this end but it does make a specific recommendation regarding the Martin Goodman Trail in its policies section.

5. f) protect, improve and where possible extend the Martin Goodman/Waterfront Trail as a continuous waterfront route for cyclists, pedestrians and people with disabilities.

2. d) Promote mixed use development to increase opportunities for living close to work and to encourage walking and cycling for local trips;

In the 3rd set of policies in this section it outlines how the City's transportation network will be maintained and developed. All of these policies deal with things like road widening, providing access for transit vehicles on streets and using hydro corridors for future transit routes. Cycling is not directly mentioned. As a key element of the transportation system one could assume that cycling infrastructure should get some attention as the transportation network is maintained and developed over the next 30 years. Granted the Bike Plan, mentioned elsewhere in the Official Plan, elaborates on how the Bikeway Network will be developed over the next ten years. However as a general principle cyclists should be taken into consideration as road widths are determined and streets are designed whether or not they have a bike lane on them. As the Toronto Bike Plan states "Every street is a cycling street."

As a lay person, ie. not a transportation planner, I look at the Official Plan and feel encouraged by the amount that cycling is recognized an incorporated in the future plans of the city. I also feel somewhat concerned that there should be more there like integration of cycling and transit. If there are readers who have more experience in the area and have more opinions pro or con please feel free to post a comment on this article.

This public meeting will give people a chance to give their opinions on the plan laid out for the City. You can do so by making a deputation to the committee or by sending in written comments. Often we feel that it is necessary to comment when our issue is not being addressed as we feel it should be. If it seems cycling may be getting the recognition it deserved there is a temptation to not make any comments. I think it is worthwhile for cyclists to let the Councillors and city staff know that we appreciate how they have included cycling in the official plan and let them know what more we would like to see there.

To get on the list for deputations you have to contact notify the City Clerk, attention: Christine Archibald, Committee Administrator, Planning and Transportation Committee, at 416-392-7039, by no later than Monday, September 23, 2002. If you want to submit written comments they should be to City Clerk, attention: Christine Archibald, Committee Administrator, Planning and Transportation Committee, 4th Floor West, 100 Queen Street West, Toronto, ON, M5H 2N2, or by Fax: 416-392-1879, by September 11, 2002 in order to be included on the agenda. You can submit them later. The announcement of the meeting with more details are posted on the City's web site as a PDF file.