The Week at Toronto City Hall for May 20-24, featuring a full preview of the May Council meeting, with debates on housing, e-scooters, construction and more
Sad news about Councillor Robinson. There will probably be a by-election to replace her which won't happen until September at the earliest. What happens though in the interim? Will the absence of Robinson's vote on council affect things? Thoughts?
Definitely sad. You're right about the by-election and I'd guess similar on the timing. Robinson was never a particularly solid vote for Chow and on housing issues tended toward the NIMBY side of things. I'd expect her absence will be felt most in housing debates like the one this week on allowing more density on major streets.
The ongoing band of electric kick scooters confuses and infuriates me. I use an electric Kick Scooter and I estimate it is reduced my car trips by about 30%. How can we say that all the other types of electric micro Mobility are fine but kick scooters are not!? How is it even legal to make that kind of ban? Like if my Kick Scooter had a seat all of a sudden it would be legal? I'm pretty sure this ban is a reaction to rental electric scooters that caused chaos in the streets but it's an unacceptable reaction. We don't ban cars because they're killing pedestrians. We don't ban bicycles because some idiots drive them on the sidewalk.
I find it hard to fathom too. The city has clearly already lost the war on this one. Spending a huge chunk of money spinning up an anti-scooter enforcement squad is a ridiculous notion.
One thing I've definitely noted is that the explosion of shared e-scooter systems in cities around the world definitely poisoned the well on this issue. A lot of the arguments in support of maintaining a ban on e-scooters (sidewalk clutter, novice riders getting injured, etc) really don't apply to private ownership.
I'd like to see what action the city will take to enforce a ban on scooters. At least in downtown, they are everywhere. Based on TPS inaction on enforcing rules for motorists, I don't see scooters going anywhere any time soon, regardless of what city council decides.
Agreed - I think the toothpaste is out of the tube on this one. There's a line in the new staff report that claims the ban has been effective at reducing the number of scooters on the streets. I'm pretty skeptical!
I do think we need some federal/provincial regulations on design, safety features, etc for e-scooters. That seems to be a serious gap at the moment.
Re: the litter audit. I don't know what criteria they use to gauge the amount of each type of item in the list (maybe weight?) but from the experience of someone who periodically picks up litter in my local park, by far the most litter is small bits of plastic from wrappers of various food products.
Sad news about Councillor Robinson. There will probably be a by-election to replace her which won't happen until September at the earliest. What happens though in the interim? Will the absence of Robinson's vote on council affect things? Thoughts?
Definitely sad. You're right about the by-election and I'd guess similar on the timing. Robinson was never a particularly solid vote for Chow and on housing issues tended toward the NIMBY side of things. I'd expect her absence will be felt most in housing debates like the one this week on allowing more density on major streets.
The ongoing band of electric kick scooters confuses and infuriates me. I use an electric Kick Scooter and I estimate it is reduced my car trips by about 30%. How can we say that all the other types of electric micro Mobility are fine but kick scooters are not!? How is it even legal to make that kind of ban? Like if my Kick Scooter had a seat all of a sudden it would be legal? I'm pretty sure this ban is a reaction to rental electric scooters that caused chaos in the streets but it's an unacceptable reaction. We don't ban cars because they're killing pedestrians. We don't ban bicycles because some idiots drive them on the sidewalk.
I find it hard to fathom too. The city has clearly already lost the war on this one. Spending a huge chunk of money spinning up an anti-scooter enforcement squad is a ridiculous notion.
One thing I've definitely noted is that the explosion of shared e-scooter systems in cities around the world definitely poisoned the well on this issue. A lot of the arguments in support of maintaining a ban on e-scooters (sidewalk clutter, novice riders getting injured, etc) really don't apply to private ownership.
I'd like to see what action the city will take to enforce a ban on scooters. At least in downtown, they are everywhere. Based on TPS inaction on enforcing rules for motorists, I don't see scooters going anywhere any time soon, regardless of what city council decides.
Agreed - I think the toothpaste is out of the tube on this one. There's a line in the new staff report that claims the ban has been effective at reducing the number of scooters on the streets. I'm pretty skeptical!
I do think we need some federal/provincial regulations on design, safety features, etc for e-scooters. That seems to be a serious gap at the moment.
Re: the litter audit. I don't know what criteria they use to gauge the amount of each type of item in the list (maybe weight?) but from the experience of someone who periodically picks up litter in my local park, by far the most litter is small bits of plastic from wrappers of various food products.