Councillor Morley has seconded a motion to protest Premier Ford’s plan to remove bike lanes.
Ward 3 Councillor Amber Morley is taking on Premier Doug Ford over the removal of controversial bike lanes.
Morley, a cyclist, has seconded a motion by Councillor Dianne Saxe taking Ford to task for straying from his lane by stepping on Toronto infrastructure claims.
The motion which will be considered by City Council on November 13 calls for the City Manager to write a letter to Ford protesting ‘the overreach’ of his anti-bike-lane Bill 212.
The Bill will give the Ontario government the power to restrict and remove bike lanes that use a lane of traffic in a bid to curb vehicle congestion.
The motion if approved will see a letter of protest from Council asking Ford “to respect municipalities’ jurisdiction to manage compete claims for its own infrastructure.”
Premier Doug Ford has said he will remove bike lanes on busy streets to ease traffic congestion.
It calls for the withdrawal of proposed Section 195.2 of the Highway Traffic Act, that is before the Ontario Legislature.
The motion states that Toronto, with a population of 2,794,356 in 2021, is the fourth-most populous city in North America.
“Our population, our economy and our government are larger than those of every Canadian province except British Columbia, Alberta, Quebec and Ontario,” according to the councillors.
It said Toronto is one of the most multicultural and cosmopolitan cities and the economic engine of Ontario, providing large subsidies to the province and other parts of Canada.
“Toronto provides a disproportionately large share of the revenue of the provincial government,” it states.
“
Ward 3 Councillor Amber Morley says the province is overstepping its reach into the handling of City infrastructure.
The City of Toronto owns, pays for, maintains and operates most of the infrastructure that allows ‘this goose to lay its golden eggs, in an environment of overwhelming and competing demands,” the motion declared.
“Managing and allocating this public infrastructure so as to appropriately balance these competing demands is a central function of municipal government,” the councillors said. It is “essential to allow us to do the jobs we were elected to do.”
They said Bill 212 is an ‘attack on the people of Toronto, proposing to wastefully tear up millions of dollars of newly constructed roads, to distort how Council balances demands for street space, climate action, affordability, road safety, tree cover and quality of life.”
The province plans to remove the bike lanes on busy streets to improve traffic flow and increase small business sales.