Whose call are the bike lanes?

Set aside whether you cycle. The interesting fight here is a constitutional one, and it has now been fought.

Roads are municipal. Municipalities are creatures of the province, which can in principle direct what happens on any of them. In 2024 the province legislated the removal of about nineteen kilometres of protected lanes on Bloor, Yonge and University. Cycle Toronto challenged it. In July 2025 a Superior Court judge found the removal unconstitutional, because it would put people at greater risk of death. In August 2026 three judges of the Court of Appeal reversed him: there is no constitutional obligation to regulate a road in any particular way. Removal started on Bloor between Islington and Royal York in the first week of September. The city puts the cost of taking out what the province wants gone at about $48 million.

The argument for provincial involvement is that a major arterial is not a local street: it carries traffic from four municipalities away, and the council of the one it happens to run through is elected by none of them.

The argument against is that if the province can reach down to the level of a single painted lane, there is no meaningful municipal jurisdiction over anything, and the next thing it reaches for will not be a bike lane.

Both arguments are made by people who then vote entirely on whether they personally like the lane.

Sources: CBC, the Court of Appeal decision · CBC, removal and reconfiguration begins · CP24, work starts on Bloor West · Cycle Toronto v. Ontario