Road design, safety and Vision Zero

[ijmorlan]

So it looks like a large group of cycling advocates stopped traffic on Lakeshore Blvd in Toronto:

https://twitter.com/samwightt/status/157...8228249600

I see this in the same vein as the tire deflators campaign. (Both are primarily an inconvenience only and delay people collectively about the same order of magnitude of time).

But this is the kind of thing I think we are going to start seeing more of. I have no surprise to see it happen in Toronto given the Mayor and Police abhorrent campaign of harassment and oppression of cyclists.

And of course, no surprise, but there are clear parallels to the protests in Amsterdam in the 70s.

I actually consider this much more appropriate than the deflators. It’s an actual protest, with people congregating on the scene and making their demands known, rather than simply doing what is indistinguishable from random mischief other than the leaflets left behind. Also, if any one protester goes too far, they can be admonished by their fellow protesters or, if necessary, arrested; whereas if a tire deflator decides they’re not doing enough and smashes a window, it’s a lot harder for their compatriots to tell them they’ve crossed the line.

My only concern is that they don’t seem to be leaving any way for the stopped drivers to leave. If the car in front, for example, is just stuck there for hours (days? weeks?) I can’t agree with that. Street closing protests need to open a lane to allow stopped cars to leave. Better yet, block the entrance to a road segment, not the exit. It will cause traffic chaos, but not effectively imprison some people.