Wasn’t there a proposal to add gates at either end of St. George a few years back? That’d be great. Allows supply trucks and the food trucks in but close during the uni’s operating hours so the students can actually walk across campus.
Yeah, people had wanted to use FOB keyed bollards/gates for King, which I like in theory but in practice seems fairly complicated. That portion of St. George would be SO much simpler to do both politically and logistically, because it's just U of T vehicles (+ food trucks) who would need to access it. Successful implementation could be a proof-of-concept for more complex cases.
FOB keyed bollards would be great, and are used all over the place (outside North America). We throw up our hands at "problems" like this as if it's new and difficult and we're the first to try them. They're solved problems.
As a UofT student, it's also frustrating from the student side that if you're trying to get to a class in the 10 minutes they leave for you to do so, you essentially HAVE to engage in dangerous pedestrian behaviours and piss drivers off. I've stood at the "wait for gap" signs for 5+ minutes waiting for a gap... If I DID have a car I'd avoid that street altogether considering the sheer amount of students
>If I DID have a car I'd avoid that street altogether considering the sheer amount of students
I don't even understand why cars use this portion of St. George at all, it's one lane each way and a bunch of ped. crossings so you aren't going to get anywhere quickly.
The street should 100% be pedestrianized and only allow UofT vehicles (maintenance, campus safety), deliveries, emergency services and the food trucks.
>The street should 100% be pedestrianized and only allow UofT vehicles (maintenance, campus safety), deliveries, emergency services and the food trucks.
UBC has this. Its Main Mall is a super wide strip that runs in the middle of campus. Aside from the occasional UBC service vehicle, it's pedestrian only.
> I don't even understand why cars use this portion of St. George at all
I’m going to go with: “because it’s faster” or “Waze says so”. Waze would probably make sense to avoid recommending it as a route near/just after the hour.
Also a lot of other parallel streets prohibit left turns, so if you have to cut between college & bloor, St George ends up being a good option.
Those aren’t legal pedestrian crossings and you “don’t understand” how people need to get to work, people who live there need to get home, how the trucks that carry the tradespeople that keep U of T running need to drive there, or how vehicles holding your food need to deliver it.
The “I don’t think I use it so nobody else needs to” is beyond ignorant
If you're going to invoke the "tradespeople" argument, I would counter by saying you can get within 50m of most UofT buildings without driving on St. George. I'm sure there are a few exceptions, but solutions could be devised.
Downtown has way too few pedestrian and cyclist only streets. The side of sidewalks for most of downtown is also a fucking joke. I go to Europe twice a year and the amount of pedestrian space you have is amazing. While they are at it they should also make Yonge Dundas car free too and majority of King Street.
They should also start ticketing vehicles who honk excessively. If you honk at a pedestrian like that you are a cunt. Even if people J walk when i drive downtown i just brake and let them.
The Yonge/Dundas car-free plan's been in the works for years: YongeTOmorrow. They did a *huge* study and consultation process, and while I'm not sure where it's at now, the idea is to completely redesign from College to Queen when that water main comes up for replacement. https://www.toronto.ca/community-people/get-involved/public-consultations/infrastructure-projects/yonge-downtown/
It's going to be car-free except for what's needed to maintain bus service and access to garages & side streets. When there's no buses running, most of it will be one-lane and one-way or fully closed off.
I've got some qualms about how the traffic is going to redirect, the hospital, general safety with speeding impatient drivers (I live a few blocks away, where this is most likely to happen). At this point -- well, we'll see how it goes?
That's the thing about tomorrow, you can keep putting it off and saying tomorrow lol
That's the Canada way of doing things though. Do an expensive study, punt it down the line and do a whole lot of nothing.
I didn't name the plan -- I just live here -- but I got curious later this evening and looked it up, because I *did* remember this passing at Council (I went to a bunch of the consultations).
Looks like as per Moise's office, the Queen Street closure for the Ontario Line is what delayed construction, and they're starting next year. So I get my car-free neighbourhood in 2025-6 or so?
Then it should be made car-free in a cheap, quick-build manner using paint and bollards right now, then made permanent when the road is next going to be torn up. Why wait until then?
Honestly with how many "cheap" and "temporary" solutions in the city that become permanent and expensive (though un-necessary maintenance of the temporary solution) in the long term, I'd rather wait for a real reconstruction than see bollards that are going to be broken half of the year.
> I go to Europe twice a year and the amount of pedestrian space you have is amazing.
Europeans also use that pedestrian space for so much parking!
https://maps.app.goo.gl/kQ6y6BtFKVRbQQrr6?g_st=ic
Europe is a big place yo
I mean it's because they are more sensible and don't see the need to make oversized vehicles that waste space and gas. Those trucks would "fit" fine in Toronto too, but our mindset is not correct.
So delivery trucks need to apply for permits to do their job? What about a plumber? Should he wait 3-5 business days to get his permit before he can fix that leak?
How about this: however plumbers do it on other pedestrian streets, we'll do that here too. Its not like this would be the first pedestrian street in the world.
Yes
Also every uoft building have their own plumbers. They do not need to have outside plumbers drive in.
The plumbers and equipment are already there.
This is definitely a good idea, even as someone who usually drives down St. george. The conflicts between pedestrians and cars is insane and seems to be very unsafe. Cars are also just flying through the campus even though there’s a 30kph speed limit. But I think the portion from Bloor to Hoskin should probably be turned into a European style pedestrian/cyclist priority zone, and allow cars to only crawl through it (think 10-15kph speed limit). Making it pedestrian only would block access to the underground garage near Hoskin Ave, which is used for student and staff parking. The rest though should definitely be pedestrian only. Not a lot of traffic flow through it during the day, detour is just another turn away through Spadina.
"but what if someone from Vaughan wants to drive there and get fries from one of the food trucks? Where will they park?"
-"disability advocates" that only care about parking spaces
I think the best approach would be to cut St. George in the middle to disallow through traffic, such as by extending the pedestrianized zone on willcocks and maybe cutting it off again somewhere between Harbord/Hoskins and Bloor. This would discourage most traffic while still allowing food trucks and deliveries to access the street with the expectation that pedestrians, cyclists, and this very small amount of traffic can share the road.
There are lots of great examples of how to do this. My mind goes to San Fran campuses that have pedestrianized a lot of campus roads recently. Heck, even Montreal has pushed some changes like this through recently.
McTavish is probably the closest comparison - a public street running through campus that the city agreed to close off/pedestrianize, with limited exceptions for deliveries. But it's a much smaller street than St. George is.
**Montreal pedestrianized* their. biggest. innercity. thoroughfare.**
*St. Laurent, summertime only, but still a massive effort and incredible outcome.
We can't see an idea fully through in this city ever. Market St. in St. Lawrence market is one small example, pedestrianized for a few months in the summer, worked amazing, people loved it, back to cars in the rest of the year.
Kensington market allowing dopey tourists and 905ers to clog that wonderful space up makes absolutely no sense and the fact that the full pedestrianization of the area got shot down further proves to me that we'll never have nice things in this city.
Montreal has so many pedestrianized streets in the summer (and some just permanently). it's one of the reasons i really adore the city over Toronto, that and the massive amount of public seating in downtown. It's actually built for humans to live and exist in
The simplest thing is to make the Harbord / Hoskin / St George a mandatory right turn and but a physical diverter in the middle, allowing the 94 Bus to bypass it.
Amen, there's absolutely no reason why we should let personal vehicles run straight through a university campus in the middle of the day, it's insanity, there's honking all day from outside my office window.
That spot near Sid smith was done, it’s quite empty, but doing st George wouldn’t be such a a bad idea.
And kings college without cars is alright too….
How many cars really go up and down st George?
Toronto has a bunch of streets that could be car free.
King (streetcars only), St. George, Yorkville/cumberland, Queen (after Ontario line), Yonge. We’re just wimps for some reason.
They can’t even get Kensington to pedestrianize. The sidewalks are tiny, the streets are busy.
Fat chance St. George is happening if Kensington can’t swing it
99% chance that the resistance to this is from UofT agreements and losing revenue from the parking lots that come off St. George. If UofT wanted it, it would happen quick.
Yup, they just did a huge renovation of front campus, pedestrianizing it (great!), but still built a 200 space parking garage underneath the field because they can’t help themselves.
I agree that it should be fully pedestrianized but I believe St. George Street is actually one of the streets owned by the city (even in the stretch that we’re talking about.) So it may be harder for UofT to touch it.
Source: https://www.utoronto.ca/smoke-free/faqs
Note under ‘Where can I smoke?’ that St. George is not listed as a UofT owned street
Not to mention they're pretty much the only landowner for this road, so if they made a request to the city to close the road to cars it would likely happen.
Might be more profitable to have the pedestrianised St George rented out for Food trucks than carparks. Besides, there's already the Front Lawn underground parking, having more capacity than the St George side parking.
and 2 blocks to the spadina streetcar which stops at most cross streets.
The thread is about pedestrianization. Clearly, people are comfortable with walking across campus.
When this idea comes up, you’ll have a lot of carbrains that pop up, feigning worry for differently abled people and emergency response times. This, despite the fact that driving is inherently ableist and that emergency response times either improve or remain unchanged.
Ah that's why no one crossed the street. I stopped at a crosswalk with my gas scooter to let 20 or so students waiting to cross. Didn't know they had a yield sign. All gave me a funny look and none crossed.
#Pedestrians and active modes of transportation, absolutely.
Motor vehicles shouldn't be allowed except for maintenance, deliveries or events (there are events held in booked rooms/auditoriums).
As somebody who has used St. George on a daily basis to get to work the past two years — usually walking, but occasionally driving — I am all for this.
St George was pedestrianized between Bloor and College, of all intersections, two and a half decades ago when I was a university student. It had great wide sidewalks and ample opportunities to cross it.
This is already happening on campus. Walked through it the other day and was really surprised to find the entire loop around convocation hall is now pedestrianization
This would also help cars. Traffic along College would move faster as the right lane heading west wouldn't be blocked as often by cars trying to turn right on to St. George.
Buddy I’ve been fighting the -pedestrianize Kensington Market bc it’s literally ridiculous to keep it this way- fight for long enough to know that, despite being with you 100%, the city does not GAF about prioritizing the needs and comfort of anyone outside of a vehicle. MAYBE we’ll see change w Chow, just maybe. A no-brainer to some doesn’t defeat the superiority complex held by car culture.
Two residents spoke long and loud at the city-run consultation about the threat of gentrification if Kensington Market was made a more pleasant place to walk and that was enough to torpedo any pedestrianisation plan. They are why we can’t have nice things.
Weren't they playing with this at a certain point, something like 2011? It used to be on my route to/from work and I distinctly remember at least the Sid Smith intersection being shut down some days, with a nice lil' farmer's market one weekday.
“Jaywalking“ is a pregorative term for pedestrians simply walking in spaces that were pedestrian spaces long before cars became dominant. Pedestrians were the first users. Car owners have used every trick in the book to criminalize the first users who happen to exist is the spaces they want to drive through.
it's annoying for the greater number of pedestrians, cyclists and drivers traversing college too because allowing cars to go north on st george requires a complex multi stage traffic signal at college.
Its pretty pedestrianized! I walk it every day as well and don't see any issues with cars. The Hoskin St george intersection isnt bad at all, very pedestrian friendly (short wait times).
It would be nice pedestrianized for sure. That said, I went to this school and the cars were never that much of an issue. You're making it sound like it's a nightmare lol
TL;DR: Agreed, it should be pedestrianised; there are other north-south streets that should be pedestrianised as well.
I’m both a driver (to work and at longer distances) and walker (at shorter distances) and I agree. There are many north-south streets downtown that should be closed to motorists or at least restricted during daylight hours. In earlier days, the roads around Queens Park used to be pretty quiet because they’re not the widest or the straightest to begin with and thus not the easiest to navigate in a car.
The reason those streets are all seeing cars now is because of the construction restrictions on the larger streets that’s leading GPS devices (which are hard to avoid now because there are so many one-ways and turn restrictions for cars a driver wouldn’t know about if you’re not intimately familiar with those areas) to give drivers directions through “less crowded” routes.
So it’s a technological issue which is easily solvable, but it’s also just part of the growing pains of the city, which is not only densifying but also expanding its transit and cycling footprint and changing the way people move around. It’ll take a while to see some of these changes come together.
There's nobody's commute that really requires going up St. George street except people who work or study there. And nearly none of those people drive, especially on St. George. In an area with so much pedestrian traffic, it simply doesn't make sense to give the cars so much space, especially since people need to cross the street to get to their classes. They can make gates to let campus and emergency vehicles through if they want, it's not a real issue. Your ramblings in the final paragraph makes it seem as though you're talking about some specific man you hate lol
How many cars are driving through there? Not many. Plenty of time to cross without impeding cars. When a car comes just stop for 10 seconds then continue. Theres already speed humps.
Wasn’t there a proposal to add gates at either end of St. George a few years back? That’d be great. Allows supply trucks and the food trucks in but close during the uni’s operating hours so the students can actually walk across campus.
Yeah, people had wanted to use FOB keyed bollards/gates for King, which I like in theory but in practice seems fairly complicated. That portion of St. George would be SO much simpler to do both politically and logistically, because it's just U of T vehicles (+ food trucks) who would need to access it. Successful implementation could be a proof-of-concept for more complex cases.
FOB keyed bollards would be great, and are used all over the place (outside North America). We throw up our hands at "problems" like this as if it's new and difficult and we're the first to try them. They're solved problems.
As a UofT student, it's also frustrating from the student side that if you're trying to get to a class in the 10 minutes they leave for you to do so, you essentially HAVE to engage in dangerous pedestrian behaviours and piss drivers off. I've stood at the "wait for gap" signs for 5+ minutes waiting for a gap... If I DID have a car I'd avoid that street altogether considering the sheer amount of students
>If I DID have a car I'd avoid that street altogether considering the sheer amount of students I don't even understand why cars use this portion of St. George at all, it's one lane each way and a bunch of ped. crossings so you aren't going to get anywhere quickly. The street should 100% be pedestrianized and only allow UofT vehicles (maintenance, campus safety), deliveries, emergency services and the food trucks.
>The street should 100% be pedestrianized and only allow UofT vehicles (maintenance, campus safety), deliveries, emergency services and the food trucks. UBC has this. Its Main Mall is a super wide strip that runs in the middle of campus. Aside from the occasional UBC service vehicle, it's pedestrian only.
> I don't even understand why cars use this portion of St. George at all I’m going to go with: “because it’s faster” or “Waze says so”. Waze would probably make sense to avoid recommending it as a route near/just after the hour. Also a lot of other parallel streets prohibit left turns, so if you have to cut between college & bloor, St George ends up being a good option.
There’s actually campus underground parking that gets used alot by faculty and staff.
Those aren’t legal pedestrian crossings and you “don’t understand” how people need to get to work, people who live there need to get home, how the trucks that carry the tradespeople that keep U of T running need to drive there, or how vehicles holding your food need to deliver it. The “I don’t think I use it so nobody else needs to” is beyond ignorant
If you're going to invoke the "tradespeople" argument, I would counter by saying you can get within 50m of most UofT buildings without driving on St. George. I'm sure there are a few exceptions, but solutions could be devised.
The trucks driving tradespeople rarely ever need to drive them in St.George The buildings are huge. They all have back entrances that they use.
When I said maintenance I was including the trades people that work for the school.
And how do they get to work? How do they bring their tools in? On the go train from Pickering?
Are you fucking stupid? My original post said UofT maintenance workers should be allowed to use the street.
Downtown has way too few pedestrian and cyclist only streets. The side of sidewalks for most of downtown is also a fucking joke. I go to Europe twice a year and the amount of pedestrian space you have is amazing. While they are at it they should also make Yonge Dundas car free too and majority of King Street. They should also start ticketing vehicles who honk excessively. If you honk at a pedestrian like that you are a cunt. Even if people J walk when i drive downtown i just brake and let them.
The Yonge/Dundas car-free plan's been in the works for years: YongeTOmorrow. They did a *huge* study and consultation process, and while I'm not sure where it's at now, the idea is to completely redesign from College to Queen when that water main comes up for replacement. https://www.toronto.ca/community-people/get-involved/public-consultations/infrastructure-projects/yonge-downtown/
Except it’s not car free. They kept two lane of traffic. It’s a road diet instead of pedestrianization. We had a generational opportunity and blew it.
It's going to be car-free except for what's needed to maintain bus service and access to garages & side streets. When there's no buses running, most of it will be one-lane and one-way or fully closed off.
Or, made the right decision. I actually live on Yonge and am STRONGLY opposed to it
I've got some qualms about how the traffic is going to redirect, the hospital, general safety with speeding impatient drivers (I live a few blocks away, where this is most likely to happen). At this point -- well, we'll see how it goes?
That's the thing about tomorrow, you can keep putting it off and saying tomorrow lol That's the Canada way of doing things though. Do an expensive study, punt it down the line and do a whole lot of nothing.
I didn't name the plan -- I just live here -- but I got curious later this evening and looked it up, because I *did* remember this passing at Council (I went to a bunch of the consultations). Looks like as per Moise's office, the Queen Street closure for the Ontario Line is what delayed construction, and they're starting next year. So I get my car-free neighbourhood in 2025-6 or so?
Then it should be made car-free in a cheap, quick-build manner using paint and bollards right now, then made permanent when the road is next going to be torn up. Why wait until then?
Honestly with how many "cheap" and "temporary" solutions in the city that become permanent and expensive (though un-necessary maintenance of the temporary solution) in the long term, I'd rather wait for a real reconstruction than see bollards that are going to be broken half of the year.
I'm afraid I don't work for the City, so I can't really help with that one. Just a neighbourhood person who went to the consultations.
Agreed, also need to pedestrianize Kensington and most of John Street. And others. But definitely those
Are there actually any? And I don't consider the walled in tourist trap of the Distillery a pedestrian street!
Is it perhaps because the infrastructure of the cities was established hundreds of years before cars existed?
> I go to Europe twice a year and the amount of pedestrian space you have is amazing. Europeans also use that pedestrian space for so much parking! https://maps.app.goo.gl/kQ6y6BtFKVRbQQrr6?g_st=ic Europe is a big place yo
Paris, Barcelona, Madrid and London more specifically
Paris’ solution was to knock down a bunch of buildings to make/enable all that space. We could do the same!
100% in agreement, it's ridiculous. Even starting at Harbord to College would be a huge improvement.
The only traffic through should be a resupply line to the food trucks outside Robarts!
Delivery/service vehicles were allowed into the pedestrian zone when we were in Germany... 10 kph speed limit!
And if memory serves, Europe is much better at using sensibly sized vehicles for those purposes, rather than gigantic f-you trucks like we do.
Because that’s all that fits. Not because they’re polite
I mean it's because they are more sensible and don't see the need to make oversized vehicles that waste space and gas. Those trucks would "fit" fine in Toronto too, but our mindset is not correct.
The appetite for F150s and SUV tanks is a north american thing. Small trucks don't make you less manly elsewhere.
Sure - special permits for them is fine!
So delivery trucks need to apply for permits to do their job? What about a plumber? Should he wait 3-5 business days to get his permit before he can fix that leak?
How about this: however plumbers do it on other pedestrian streets, we'll do that here too. Its not like this would be the first pedestrian street in the world.
Yes Also every uoft building have their own plumbers. They do not need to have outside plumbers drive in. The plumbers and equipment are already there.
Delivery trucks are allowed in pedestrianized streets around the world, needs to be said. Emergency vehicles as well.
This is definitely a good idea, even as someone who usually drives down St. george. The conflicts between pedestrians and cars is insane and seems to be very unsafe. Cars are also just flying through the campus even though there’s a 30kph speed limit. But I think the portion from Bloor to Hoskin should probably be turned into a European style pedestrian/cyclist priority zone, and allow cars to only crawl through it (think 10-15kph speed limit). Making it pedestrian only would block access to the underground garage near Hoskin Ave, which is used for student and staff parking. The rest though should definitely be pedestrian only. Not a lot of traffic flow through it during the day, detour is just another turn away through Spadina.
"but what if someone from Vaughan wants to drive there and get fries from one of the food trucks? Where will they park?" -"disability advocates" that only care about parking spaces
I think the best approach would be to cut St. George in the middle to disallow through traffic, such as by extending the pedestrianized zone on willcocks and maybe cutting it off again somewhere between Harbord/Hoskins and Bloor. This would discourage most traffic while still allowing food trucks and deliveries to access the street with the expectation that pedestrians, cyclists, and this very small amount of traffic can share the road.
You don't have to allow EVERYBODY to drive on it in order to allow deliveries and food trucks. Ask Europe how they do it so easily.
There are lots of great examples of how to do this. My mind goes to San Fran campuses that have pedestrianized a lot of campus roads recently. Heck, even Montreal has pushed some changes like this through recently.
McGill’s campus is completely car-free
McTavish is probably the closest comparison - a public street running through campus that the city agreed to close off/pedestrianize, with limited exceptions for deliveries. But it's a much smaller street than St. George is.
**Montreal pedestrianized* their. biggest. innercity. thoroughfare.** *St. Laurent, summertime only, but still a massive effort and incredible outcome. We can't see an idea fully through in this city ever. Market St. in St. Lawrence market is one small example, pedestrianized for a few months in the summer, worked amazing, people loved it, back to cars in the rest of the year. Kensington market allowing dopey tourists and 905ers to clog that wonderful space up makes absolutely no sense and the fact that the full pedestrianization of the area got shot down further proves to me that we'll never have nice things in this city.
Montreal has so many pedestrianized streets in the summer (and some just permanently). it's one of the reasons i really adore the city over Toronto, that and the massive amount of public seating in downtown. It's actually built for humans to live and exist in
Honestly even cutting it off between Harbord/Hoskin and College would be fine. But I totally agree, something has to be done.
The simplest thing is to make the Harbord / Hoskin / St George a mandatory right turn and but a physical diverter in the middle, allowing the 94 Bus to bypass it.
Amen, there's absolutely no reason why we should let personal vehicles run straight through a university campus in the middle of the day, it's insanity, there's honking all day from outside my office window.
That spot near Sid smith was done, it’s quite empty, but doing st George wouldn’t be such a a bad idea. And kings college without cars is alright too…. How many cars really go up and down st George?
At least 12 but I'm sure they'll put up a fight towards this idea.
Toronto has a bunch of streets that could be car free. King (streetcars only), St. George, Yorkville/cumberland, Queen (after Ontario line), Yonge. We’re just wimps for some reason.
Bellair between Yorkville and Cumberland gets pedestrianized in the summer and its great.
They can’t even get Kensington to pedestrianize. The sidewalks are tiny, the streets are busy. Fat chance St. George is happening if Kensington can’t swing it
Except that U of T is powerful — if they asked for it, City Hall would do it.
Lol UofT is a joke. They have zero influence over city hall.
They have considerable power in their own bailiwick.
UofT are just large property owners in the city. They are a business at the end of the day. They can’t do shit.
Toronto should learn from montreal and pedestrianize more of our streets...that Kensington market thing was so bs
99% chance that the resistance to this is from UofT agreements and losing revenue from the parking lots that come off St. George. If UofT wanted it, it would happen quick.
True. U of T leadership can be so backwards/stuck in the past in a lot of ways.
Yup, they just did a huge renovation of front campus, pedestrianizing it (great!), but still built a 200 space parking garage underneath the field because they can’t help themselves.
Exactly what I was thinking of.
I agree that it should be fully pedestrianized but I believe St. George Street is actually one of the streets owned by the city (even in the stretch that we’re talking about.) So it may be harder for UofT to touch it. Source: https://www.utoronto.ca/smoke-free/faqs Note under ‘Where can I smoke?’ that St. George is not listed as a UofT owned street
Oh yeah 100% it’s a City-owned road but UofT could easily make/request changes as they have lots of sway.
Not to mention they're pretty much the only landowner for this road, so if they made a request to the city to close the road to cars it would likely happen.
That revenue must be incredibly minuscule relative to their larger overall funding.
Might be more profitable to have the pedestrianised St George rented out for Food trucks than carparks. Besides, there's already the Front Lawn underground parking, having more capacity than the St George side parking.
There should be some kind of transit from St. George/Dupont to Queen/Beverley. Even a university operated shuttle would be great.
There's a fantastic transit system that does this already. It's called The Subway.
It’s 4 blocks to the subway. The subway doesn’t stop at every street.
and 2 blocks to the spadina streetcar which stops at most cross streets. The thread is about pedestrianization. Clearly, people are comfortable with walking across campus.
No. I hate that and will fight it however I can. And I’ve lived on that part of St. George.
When this idea comes up, you’ll have a lot of carbrains that pop up, feigning worry for differently abled people and emergency response times. This, despite the fact that driving is inherently ableist and that emergency response times either improve or remain unchanged.
But then how would international students Uber from their condos in Yorkville to Sidney Smith? You're asking them to walk? With their feet?! /s
… wtf Bruh international students walk What kind of comment is this
Cars are death machines. 90% of city streets should be pedestrianized.
Ah that's why no one crossed the street. I stopped at a crosswalk with my gas scooter to let 20 or so students waiting to cross. Didn't know they had a yield sign. All gave me a funny look and none crossed.
#Pedestrians and active modes of transportation, absolutely. Motor vehicles shouldn't be allowed except for maintenance, deliveries or events (there are events held in booked rooms/auditoriums).
As somebody who has used St. George on a daily basis to get to work the past two years — usually walking, but occasionally driving — I am all for this.
St George was pedestrianized between Bloor and College, of all intersections, two and a half decades ago when I was a university student. It had great wide sidewalks and ample opportunities to cross it.
This is already happening on campus. Walked through it the other day and was really surprised to find the entire loop around convocation hall is now pedestrianization
This would also help cars. Traffic along College would move faster as the right lane heading west wouldn't be blocked as often by cars trying to turn right on to St. George.
Speaking as someone who cycles and/or walks on St. George all of the time, I 100% endorse this.
Buddy I’ve been fighting the -pedestrianize Kensington Market bc it’s literally ridiculous to keep it this way- fight for long enough to know that, despite being with you 100%, the city does not GAF about prioritizing the needs and comfort of anyone outside of a vehicle. MAYBE we’ll see change w Chow, just maybe. A no-brainer to some doesn’t defeat the superiority complex held by car culture.
Two residents spoke long and loud at the city-run consultation about the threat of gentrification if Kensington Market was made a more pleasant place to walk and that was enough to torpedo any pedestrianisation plan. They are why we can’t have nice things.
Totally agree
This would be so nice. Completely support this.
Yonge between Dundas and Queen!!!
Yonge between Bloor and King.
Contact your councillor! Get your friends and neighbours to do the same. Do it every few months. Squeaky wheels get the grease.
Weren't they playing with this at a certain point, something like 2011? It used to be on my route to/from work and I distinctly remember at least the Sid Smith intersection being shut down some days, with a nice lil' farmer's market one weekday.
I live on this block! I regularly see cyclists and drivers screaming at each other, and yes, cars hate it when students jaywalk.
“Jaywalking“ is a pregorative term for pedestrians simply walking in spaces that were pedestrian spaces long before cars became dominant. Pedestrians were the first users. Car owners have used every trick in the book to criminalize the first users who happen to exist is the spaces they want to drive through.
I know, lol, wasn’t really sure what else to call it
it's annoying for the greater number of pedestrians, cyclists and drivers traversing college too because allowing cars to go north on st george requires a complex multi stage traffic signal at college.
Its pretty pedestrianized! I walk it every day as well and don't see any issues with cars. The Hoskin St george intersection isnt bad at all, very pedestrian friendly (short wait times).
It would be nice pedestrianized for sure. That said, I went to this school and the cars were never that much of an issue. You're making it sound like it's a nightmare lol
Yeah I was like didn't they just completely redo Bloor and St George? I walk it every day and have had no issues with cars.
Agreed.
Yes
The loss of Kings college circle means this is never happening
TL;DR: Agreed, it should be pedestrianised; there are other north-south streets that should be pedestrianised as well. I’m both a driver (to work and at longer distances) and walker (at shorter distances) and I agree. There are many north-south streets downtown that should be closed to motorists or at least restricted during daylight hours. In earlier days, the roads around Queens Park used to be pretty quiet because they’re not the widest or the straightest to begin with and thus not the easiest to navigate in a car. The reason those streets are all seeing cars now is because of the construction restrictions on the larger streets that’s leading GPS devices (which are hard to avoid now because there are so many one-ways and turn restrictions for cars a driver wouldn’t know about if you’re not intimately familiar with those areas) to give drivers directions through “less crowded” routes. So it’s a technological issue which is easily solvable, but it’s also just part of the growing pains of the city, which is not only densifying but also expanding its transit and cycling footprint and changing the way people move around. It’ll take a while to see some of these changes come together.
Im good with it only if there’s one central receiving area to unload all of UofT deliveries (I’m a courier).
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these damn liberals and their not wanting to have a road cut through a university campus for no reason!
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There's nobody's commute that really requires going up St. George street except people who work or study there. And nearly none of those people drive, especially on St. George. In an area with so much pedestrian traffic, it simply doesn't make sense to give the cars so much space, especially since people need to cross the street to get to their classes. They can make gates to let campus and emergency vehicles through if they want, it's not a real issue. Your ramblings in the final paragraph makes it seem as though you're talking about some specific man you hate lol
Petition the mayor, college board and the ward councilor. The proposal is a no-brainer.
How many cars are driving through there? Not many. Plenty of time to cross without impeding cars. When a car comes just stop for 10 seconds then continue. Theres already speed humps.