Bike Ottawa is looking forward to a great discussion at our AGM on Saturday. Meet our four panelists:
Melanie Bechard is a Pediatric Emergency Medicine physician at CHEO: “I wish that politicians could see the broken bodies that I treat in the emergency department because maybe then they’d finally realize how much they’re hurting people when they remove or limit protected bike lanes”
Laura Shantz, Member of the Board at Ottawa Transit Riders: “We need to get people moving around faster to make our city more livable. Both dedicated bus lanes and dedicated bike lanes work more efficiently than lanes for mixed traffic that are dominated by private vehicles. Both are more desirable than general traffic lanes.”
Koko Agborsangaya (Co-Founder – Black Girls Ride NCR): Active transportation is an equity & environmental justice issue. The lack of safe bike lanes, reliable transit and promotion of car culture underlies the assumption that everyone can afford this lifestyle. We also have strong evidence that people from minoritized communities are heavily impacted by air pollution and the effects of climate change. One size does not fit all when it comes to transportation.
Toon Dreesen, President of DC Group of Architects: “Bike lanes don’t make gridlock worse: they give people options. What makes congestion worse is underfunding transit so it’s infrequent and unreliable.”
See you there!
