[cyclelicious]

The plan is for a 16-km urban park that will connect downtown to Scarborough.

Link to article
Toronto gets sneak peek at 16-km urban park that will connect downtown to Scarborough

This is also ambitious!
More plans underway by TRCA to build a 1100km trail network throughout the GTA. It'll connect existing trails and connect communities

https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1073224439263842304

TRCA reports:

One of the great things about the strategy is that it provides additional rationale to secure greenspace to increase the natural system, and protect, restore, and enhance wildlife habitats.

 

[Toronto Goat]

I generally welcome new trails for getting around on bike or foot. But I'd lying if I said I wasn't concerned that this will bring more groms that jog with headphones on and dog walkers into riding trails. Particularly Motown. I'd like to keep foot traffic isolated to paved paths as much as possible.

 

[ghettocruiser]

Also, based on my experience on the Finch Avenue hydro trail, the transportation functionality of hydro field paths is very low.

This is simply by virtue of the fact that path users have to push the button and wait for a very long-cycle crossing light at every road they bisect. Compare with the valley trails in the Don, Humber, even Highland, where the trail goes under almost all the major throughfairs.

On the Don path, I can slow way down for a lot of headphone-wearing pedestrians and off-leash dogs, and still be much faster than on an empty hydro trail, with a 3-minute stop every 1 km. And then there's the issue of the "scenery" and crackle of power lines vs the sound of the river flowing along.

I do use the hydro field paths on a year-round basis... but it's not hard to see why they don't have a lot of users... besides me.

 

[Kay.]

Also, based on my experience on the Finch Avenue hydro trail, the transportation functionality of hydro field paths is very low.

This is simply by virtue of the fact that path users have to push the button and wait for a very long-cycle crossing light at every road they bisect.
...
I do use the hydro field paths on a year-round basis... but it's not hard to see why they don't have a lot of users... besides me.

I took a good look at that gatineau corridor last summer, and specifically with respect to the waiting time. I found I could easily beat the timing signal maybe 4 times out of 5 by simply crossing during the first available gap in traffic. On that basis, the pure transportation scenario gets better, but crossing those arterial roads like that is a sketchy business, I don't think it could possibly be done on a daily basis. It only worked for longer weekend rides, when if I didn't get the gap, I didn't even mind particularly as I still had many km of riding ahead of me. So, it does appear to be fated for recreational use primarily. I would imagine that however many millions is budgeted does also get you some tolerably good landscaping to lessen the dystopian impact of the towers. And I recall reading that a big part of the plan was simply to do no landscaping at all, but also to stop clear-mowing the space twice a year, so you'd get a sort of tall-grass prairie ecosystem after a while, with meadow birds, butterflies and whatnot, so the thinking goes.

 

[ghettocruiser]

Yep...I was trying to do this dodgy almost-legal move EB at Kennedy by merging onto the road and then getting into the left turn lane at that parking lot, but it was just unpleasant all around in even moderate traffic volumes.

The Finch corridor path light at Bayview takes absolutely forever if there's no car tripping the sensor at Ruddington... and even if I sneak across during a gap, I can just hear someone screaming in a letter to the editor about how "their" tax money was spent on a bike trail, and cyclists are still running reds.

Because, you know, rules