(Cyclists outside Queen's Park celebrating Cycle Toronto's legal win against Bill 212. Image: Joshua Best)
On April 16, 2025, the Ontario Superior Court of Justice heard the case of Cycle Toronto et al. v. Attorney General of Ontario et al., 2025.
Cycle Toronto, a member-supported charity based in Toronto, along with individual co-applicants Eva Stanger-Ross and Narada Kiondo, represented by their legal team from Ecojustice and Paliare Roland, challenged the Ontario Government's anti-bike lane legislation, Bill 212, Reducing Gridlock, Saving You Time Act, 2024. They argued that the legislated removal of 19 km of protected bike lanes in Toronto along Bloor, Yonge, and University Streets was an arbitrary and reckless violation of Section 7 of the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms, namely the right to life and security of the person in accordance with the principles of fundamental justice.
Central to the case were internal documents from the government's own experts which, contrary to repeated public statements made by Premier Doug Ford and Minister of Transportation Prabmeet Sarkaria, showed that:
- bike lanes are not a cause of traffic congestion
- there is no network of secondary routes capable of replacing the target bike lanes
- removing protected bike lanes would put people's lives at risk
On July 30, 2025, the court issued their judgement, concluding that the applicants were successful and stating that:
removing the physical separation of the target bike lanes from motor vehicle traffic for the purpose of reducing congestion is ... a breach of the Charter.
The decision is a historic win and ensures the protected bike lanes on Bloor, Yonge, and University are here to stay. At least for now. Ontario is appealing the decision. Cycle Toronto and its legal team are prepared to defend their victory in court. That hearing will take place on January 28, 2026.
Meanwhile, the Premier and Minister continue to rant against the judiciary and unrepentantly repeat false claims linking Toronto's traffic congestion to bike lanes rather than to their own transportation policy failures, while stoking a bad-faith culture war.
Wait. A Constitutional right to bike lanes?!?
No. The court’s decision does not establish a constitutional right to bike lanes. It merely affirms that governments cannot arbitrarily or recklessly endanger people’s lives through policy decisions. In this case, forcing the removal of protected bike lanes despite clear evidence that it will not address the stated goal of easing traffic congestion and will put people's lives at risk was found to violate the Charter's right to life and security of the person.
Cycle Toronto's contention remains that the entire framework of Bill 212 is flawed and a massive jurisdictional overreach. Regardless of one's opinion of these bike lanes or any others, the question of where they do and don't belong must be left to the municipal level. The Province of Ontario should stay in its lane.
Nothing in the decision obliges the government to build new bicycle lanes. As such it involves no “positive rights,” which conservatives are right to oppose. It simply requires that before a government takes the extraordinary step of ordering the removal of lanes that have already been built – an action guaranteed to cost some lives and put many more in peril – it ought at least to have some basis in evidence or logic for doing so.
-Andrew Coyne, The Globe and Mail
theglobeandmail.com/opinion/article-ontario-bike-lane-doug-ford/
As Schabas relates in his examination of the facts of the case, Ford and his ministers filled the political atmosphere last fall with bogus claims, both about the allegedly low ridership on existing bike lanes and their purported impact on traffic across the city. The applicants, in turn, methodically dug up all sorts of government evidence to the contrary, including advice provided to cabinet by its own policy officials.
-John Lorinc, Spacing
spacing.ca/toronto/2025/07/31/toronto-bike-lanes-1-ford-nation-0/
There is no Charter right to bike lanes, before or after Schabas’s decision. The only thing bike lanes and the Charter have in common is that they both protect cyclists, a fact which drives Ford, his cabinet, and the PC majority in the legislature to distraction. This week’s decision was about something both much simpler and far more important: the threshold a government needs to meet before it can cause harm to its citizens, and how many falsehoods it can tell in the process.
-John Michael McGrath, TVO
tvo.org/article/analysis-what-exactly-does-the-courts-bike-lane-decision-mean
When I started writing this post, I thought that Justice Schabas must be wrong, though it was a closer call than many of his critics allowed. I have changed my mind. This won’t be a popular opinion, but I think that, while counterintuitive — including to me — his decision is correct, given the unusual circumstances of the case. But even if it were not, the demands for the notwithstanding clause to be used to deal with his judgment are as uncalled for as they are predictable.
-Leonid Sirota, Double Aspect blog
doubleaspect.blog/2025/08/01/the-bike-lanes-and-the-clown-cars/
The July 30 ruling does not create a constitutional right to bike lanes across Canada. However, it sets an important precedent that effective and just policymaking must be rooted in credible evidence, prioritize public safety, and reflect the realities of modern transportation.
-OSPE Staff, Ontario Society of Professional Engineers
ospe.on.ca/advocacy/policy-win-ontario-court-upholds-bike-lanes-and-validates-evidence-based-transportation-planning
The Judgement:
Cycle Toronto et al. v. Attorney General of Ontario et al., 2025 ONSC 4397
REASONS FOR JUDGMENT (highlights below; sections bolded for emphasis):
The advice provided to the government, both before and after Bill 212 was passed, was that the removal of the target bike lanes to restore a lane of motor vehicle traffic will not achieve the asserted goal of the legislation, as it will not reduce congestion. The extensive evidence presented by the Applicants confirms th s advice. This includes, among other things, expert evidence, reports from the City of Toronto, and evidence of the impact of bicycle lanes in Toronto and elsewhere, which establishes that bicycle lanes, and in particular separated or protected bicycle lanes, reduce motor vehicle traffic congestion by providing an alternative method of transportation that is safer for all users of the roads . The evidence shows that restoring lanes for cars will not result in less congestion, as it will induce more people to use cars and therefore any reduction in driving time will be shortlived, if at all, and will lead to more congestion. This makes the law arbitrary.
The legislation also imposes a high and grossly disproportionate cost on section 7 rights holders. The negative effects of the impugned provision – injuries and death that will result from the restoration of a lane of motor vehicle traffic and the removal of the protected bike lanes – are completely out of sync with the aim of reducing traffic congestion, even with this objective taken at face value. As the Interveners point out, the impugned provision will also have a serious and disproportionate impact on children and on low-income individuals who must ride bicycles as an economical means of transportation, or for their work.
In contrast, the evidence presented by the Respondent consists of weak anecdotal evidence and expert opinion which is unsupported, unpersuasive and contrary to the consensus view of experts, including the expert evidence, data and studies presented by the Applicants. The government’s expert evidence does not address the key issue of whether restoring a lane of motor vehicle traffic will in fact alleviate congestion . [17] Contrary to the submissions of the Respondent, the Applicants do not seek a declaration that they have a positive constitutional right to bike lanes on public roads. The Applicants do not request or seek a court order that the government take affirmative steps to build more bike lanes. Nor do they challenge the provision requiring provincial approval for new bike lanes that involve removing a lane of motor vehicle traffic, which remains in the law passed on June 5, 2025
While this application arises from the factual context of bicycle lanes, legally the case is about the validity of a law passed by the government. The government has the right to make decisions about roads and traffic infrastructure, but where the government takes action that puts people at risk, and does so arbitrarily, its actions may be restrained by the Charter. Where the government acts rationally, in that its actions will further its desired objective, s. 7 may not be breached. But where, as here, the increased risk of harm results from action that will not further the government’s objective of reducing congestion, the government action is arbitrary and breaches s. 7 of the Charter.
This decision does not open the floodgates to Charter challenges of traffic decisions. Most road and traffic decisions are well-grounded in data and safety concerns, as one would expect, and are unlikely to be challenged as arbitrary. In any event, fear of opening the floodgates to such challenges is not in law a basis for denying individuals their Charter rights. Rights claims are not denied because others may make a similar claim or because it is administratively inconvenient to comply with the Charter.
Accordingly, I find that s. 195.6 of the HTA, in the form passed in 2024, is inconsistent with s. 7 of the Charter and not saved by s. 1 of the Charter. As to the new version of s. 195.6 passed on June 5, 2025, I find that any “reconfiguring” which has the effect of removing the physical separation of the target bike lanes from motor vehicle traffic for the purpose of reducing congestion is also a breach of the Charter. It follows, as well, that any regulation permitting the removal of the target bike lanes for that purpose would also breach the Charter.
READ THE FULL JUDGEMENT (pdf)
