Parks

BMX Ramp Fire at Wallace-Emerson Park

Several BMX ramps and other structures were destroyed in a fire at Wallace-Emerson Park at Dupont and Dufferin in the west end a couple of weeks ago. So far, it doesn't look like they have determined whether the fire was arson or an accident, but it seems suspicious to me...

I first read about this fire over at Michael's Bloor-Lansdowne Blog, but more recently City News picked up the story and posted a video.

The Toronto Police have also posted a story on their website.

Ramps have been destroyed, and artwork has been lost to the fire, but there has been at least one positive outcome to this: The volunteers who built these ramps, lead by Michael Heaton, have already made plans to rebuild the park and have opened a trust fund to collect money for this.

Today at 2:30pm, Toronto Crime Stoppers will be presenting a cheque to help cover the costs.

Leslie Spit
A lovely Sunday to be riding your bike yesterday. My partner and I went for a ride on the Leslie Spit and do some bird watching. Nice to see so many bikes out already.

The City of Toronto Official Plan envisions a city where active transportation helps to relieve congestion and improve air quality. Yet, right now less than 2 per cent of the City of Toronto Transportation budget is dedicated to walking and cycling infrastructure.

Now is your opportunity to let the city know that it needs to treat cycling as a serious form of transportation.

Tomorrow, Thursday March 6th, the City of Toronto's budget committee will meet to wrap up the 2008 Operating Budget. The Operating Budget pays for the staff that runs programs and services. For several years now cycling activists have been trying to get increases in this area without success. Although we welcome the 2008 capital budget increase in transportation services from $3.0 million to $5.5 million for cycling infrastructure (needed to install the substantial increased amount of 50 km of on-street bike lanes scheduled for this year) it is now time to ask that the cycling safety, education and promotion programs also receive a similar much-needed boost.

Martin Koob of biketoronto.ca has posted a succinct summary here. It includes an outline of the Toronto Coalition for Active Transportation's (TCAT) bike-related recommendations.

They asked council to:

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Last night, I stopped in at the open house for the Edwards Gardens and Wilket Creek repair plans. The damage from the August 2005 flooding of the park still hasn't been repaired, and as I learned last night, the damage goes beyond just the bike path. Repairs to the bike path are planned, but not going to happen right away.

Flooding of Wilket Creek

The city employees explained that the focus is currently on repairing the banks of the river and reinforcing the curves in the river with stone. This apparently makes the river slightly less naturalized, but is far from being channelized. The stones will only be positioned near the bends so that erosion is not too severe during the next major flood.