Senator’s bike lane tweets draw fire

Nicole Eaton calls Bloor St. a disaster, bicycles a luxury

Thestar.com
Aug. 29, 2016
By Sammy Hudes

A cycling advocate called Senator Nicole Eaton out of touch after she took to Twitter to criticize Toronto’s newest cycling infrastructure.

Eaton called Bloor Street “a disaster” in a tweet on Friday, two weeks after the city opened separated bike lanes between Avenue Road and Shaw Street as part of a one-year pilot.

“Can you imagine closing two lanes of Fifth Avenue to accommodate a few bicycle riders,” she wrote, referring to one of New York City’s main roadways. In fact, Fifth Avenue in Manhattan has a bike lane, stretching from 23rd Street to Washington Square North, an NYC department of transportation spokesperson confirmed.

Eaton, who represents Ontario in the Senate, questioned whether Toronto city planners were bicycle riders in the same tweet.

“Bicycles are a luxury, most of us use public transportation or walk,” she posted in a separate tweet on Friday. “Never seen a bike rider obey traffic laws. They are special.”

Her recent Twitter activity follows a similar rant earlier this month, in which she questioned why Toronto is “such a mess” and said it resembled a “third world country” compared to New York City, London and Paris.

Jared Kolb, executive director of Cycle Toronto, called Eaton “out of touch with reality here in Toronto.”

“For a lot of people, a bicycle isn’t a luxury whatsoever. This is how they get around the city as their primary vehicle,” Kolb said. “This is a question of priorities and I think that for a modern, 21st century international city, this is the right priority.”

He said he would consider reaching out to Eaton about the need for improved cycling infrastructure in Toronto.

The Bloor Street bike lane pilot cost the city about $500,000. It could accommodate upwards of 3,000 cyclists per day who use Bloor Street to bike between Bathurst Street and Spadina Avenue, according to data collected by the city in August 2015.

Eaton declined to comment on her recent Twitter musings.

University of Toronto political scientist Nelson Wiseman said the comparison “undermines” Eaton’s credibility.

“How many third world cities have bike lanes?” said Wiseman. “It sounds like she’s having a little tantrum and sometimes that works publicly.”

But he said politicians such as Eaton, who are increasingly using social media to express their positions, should use caution when doing so. To be effective, the tone of a tweet shouldn’t differ from that of a press release, Wiseman said.

“They shouldn’t be doing it themselves. They should have a social media minder. I think it should be minimalist in the sense that… it should be consistent with the persona that they want to project,” Wiseman said. “You need an alter ego. Somebody to watch what you’re putting out there specifically because your words can be used against you… and it will be by your opponents.”

Eaton, a Conservative who has served in the Senate since 2009, has made headlines in the past.

In 2011, she called for the polar bear to replace the beaver as Canada’s national symbol, referring to the latter as a “dentally defective rat.”

She also took to Twitter nearly two years ago to criticize Justin Trudeau and his late father, former Prime Minister Pierre Trudeau, over the then Liberal leader’s lack of support for Canada joining U.S.-led airstrikes in Iraq.

“The apple does not fall far from the tree. PM Trudeau refused to fight the Nazis in WWII, Stayed home comfortably in Outremont,” Eaton wrote.

Eaton earns a base salary of $145,400, plus an additional $24,500 as the Speaker pro tempore of the Senate. Her public comments are a symptom of broader issues with the Senate, according to Patrick Boyer, a former Progressive Conservative MP and author of “Our Scandalous Senate.”

He said senators nowadays have to rely on opportunism to demonstrate they are still relevant to Canadian democracy and worthy of the privileges they receive.

“Senators have been pummeled, deservedly, for several years now over their conduct and over their inability to recognize that the role they’re in is not any longer needed,” he said. “These people who are still in the senate are looking for any opportunity to kind of push back or to say something that shows them either to be real savvy or smart or got something fresh to say. The point is, nobody cares.”