An advocacy group is claiming the Bloor Street bike lanes in Etobicoke are putting lives at riskCody McCrae, the founder of community advocacy group Balance on Bloor, said Tuesday they requested Freedom of Information Act data on emergency response times along a portion of Bloor Street West and found the average response time appears to have gone up by 143 seconds since the bike lanes were installed.“That isn’t a delay. It’s a difference between survival and a tragedy,” said McCrae. “It’s not bikes versus cars. It’s about honesty and it’s about priorities.”Related:Court dismisses Ford government’s bid to appeal bike lane injunction‘Most ridiculous ruling I’ve ever seen’: Ford slams court decision on bike lanesBloor Street bike lane battle heats up as Etobicoke business owners sue city, local councillorBased on this data, McCrae says he wants transparency from the City of Toronto.“What is so hard about speaking the truth in our city now? Providing real and specific response time data without forcing groups like ours to use the FOI process.”CityNews reached out to the City and they said, “As the City of Toronto has previously stated, analysis of emergency response times before and after the installation of bike lanes on Bloor Street West shows no significant difference in response times.”The lanes here have been in place since 2023 from Kipling Avenue to South Kingsway, and remains a hot button issue in the community.“Too bad they took up two lanes traffic because congestion is pretty bad,” said one community member.“This has actually helped to bring traffic to manageable speed which I think is now 50 and it used to be 70, and it’s had a drastic improvement in safety which no one is talking about,” added a cyclist from the neighbourhood.The issue isn’t just about the use of the bike lanes. There is also an issue when it comes to the numbers. The community group says figures from city hall on the cost for bike lane removal conflicts with similar quotes that they checked out.“The City claims it would cost $48 million. We’ve gone out and got independent quotes from contractors for this work. We asked them and their estimate for this stretch of Bloor, eight kilometres, comes in $1.2 million … which is one-tenth of what the City is telling taxpayers,” said McCrae.Meanwhile, local shops say the cycling infrastructure is hurting their cash flow.Sam Pappas, the owner of the Crooked Cue restaurant, is one of 40 businesses listed in an ongoing lawsuit against the City, Councillor Amber Morley and Transportation Manager Barbara Gray.“The businesses that were already struggling from COVID, continue to struggle. People are avoiding our area,” said Pappas.Balance on Bloor says moving the lanes off a main arterial road can help alleviate ongoing gridlock in the community but cycling advocates say that idea isn’t so simple. “The network of secondary bike lanes, they just don’t exist. There’s a reason why a city like Toronto puts bike lanes on major arterial roads because people riding bikes want to get to the same place that people driving and in transit want to get to as well,” said Michael Longfield, Executive Director of Cycle TorontoThe local battle comes as the Ford government plans to appeal a recent Court decision that found its plan to remove bike lanes on three major streets in Toronto, including the one on Bloor, was unconstitutional, citing increased risks to cyclist safety and a lack of evidence that the removals would reduce traffic congestion.