Concrete barriers that have no apparent purpose are taking up part of the curb lane, just north of Wellesley St.
JACK LAKEY / TORONTO STAR
Cement barriers that don’t seem to have anything to do with construction are used to barricade part of the curb lane of southbound Bay St., just north of Wellesley St., forcing cyclists into face-moving traffic.
It takes a lot of explaining to justify concrete barriers that close a traffic lane on Bay St. for no good reason that most people can see.
One thing for sure in downtown Toronto is condo construction that extends into the curb lanes of major streets, squeezing traffic and forcing pedestrians into tunnel-like passageways made from hoarding.
It’s the price we pay for living in a city that is a premier destination for just about everyone in the world who wants to vacate their native country for the good life we take for granted.
No city in North America offers more opportunity and a better standard of living than ours, which drives the relentless demand for housing and ever-escalating real estate values.
And it is most apparent in condo construction that elbows its way into traffic, including the southbound curb lane of Bay St., just south of St. Joseph St., where another building is close to completion.
The area in front of it is covered with hoarding that occupies part of the traffic lane, but David Selley sent us a photo of concrete barriers that create a second obstruction just to the south of it.
Selley notes that the barricades “have blocked the southbound bus and bicycle lane for several months.
“No work is going on and nobody local has any idea why it is blocked. Why is it there?”
We went there and saw that the hoarding in front of the condo project is necessary, but the 15 metres or so of barriers to the south, in front of a strip of businesses just north of Wellesley St., are indeed curious.
The condo construction ends at a small lane that meets Bay, between St. Joseph and Wellesley, with no work to the south of it that would justify the need for the barriers.
STATUS: Elio Capizzano, who’s in charge of right-of-way management in that area, said he’d send a field investigator to check it out right away, to see if the barriers are necessary. And if they’re not, he said he’d arrange to get rid of them.
Source: The Toronto Star