TORONTO — Residents of the Armour Heights area are fighting the City of Toronto after numerous houses were threatened with $90 fines for having road hockey and basketball nets close to the street.
Local resident Mark Ashcroft said there is a lack of green space and safe streets for children to play in the neighbourhood near Lawrence Avenue and Avenue Road.
“We were struck with a violation of the bylaws because our nets are on city property,” Ashcroft said.
“A resident has complained that the nets impede traffic on these streets — which I find stressing.”
Ashcroft has three sons and said because of small driveways, his children often play on the sides of the road.
“I think we have to be realistic on what our priorities are,” Ashcroft said.
“Do we want to keep our children to be inside and expect them to live a sedentary lifestyles or do we want them to be active and do we want to encourage community involvement in our neighbourhood.”
Cheryl Guilfoile also has three sons and said getting the bylaw complaint was upsetting.
“It’s a quiet neighbourhood and we want our kids to play with the neighbours and be out there and having fun,” Guilfoile said.
“Someone couldn’t have walked across the street and knocked on a neighbour’s door and said ‘I’ve got an issue with this’ versus having to go to the city and having a whole street lined with warnings to take down their equipment.”
Neighbour Beatrix Wilson said she is happy to see children playing on the streets.
“It’s much better than them being inside, playing with their machines and all those kind of things, and they have fund and know each other’s neighbours,” Wilson said.
“To have somebody complain about the basketball courts is absolutely ridiculous.”
Councillor Christin Carmichael Greb says she is arranging a site assessment to hear from residents and transportation services on the issue.
“My understanding of what happened is that transportation services received a complaint from a neighbour that there were basketball nets and hockey nets were out on the streets, so bylaw officers went out and issued some violation notices that they be removed. No fines were issued,” Carmichael Greb said.
“Ultimately, the bylaw as it stands, you can’t have any sort of basketball net, hockey net, sports equipment encroaching on the right of way.”
Residents have been issued warnings for bylaw violations under Chapter 743 of the Municipal code, which states “no person shall obstruct, encumber, damage, foul, or cause or permit the obstructing, encumbering, damaging or fouling of any street, or interfere with the clearing of snow, or install or place any unauthorized encroachment, object, article or thing, on, over, along, across, under, or in a street”.
City staff say penalties for non-compliance can range from $90 to $200.
Another possible bylaw violation comes under Chapter 950, which states “no person shall play or take part in any game or sport upon a roadway and, where there are sidewalks, no person upon roller-skates, in-line skates or a skateboard, or riding in or by means of any coaster, scooter, toy vehicle, toboggan, sleigh or similar device, shall go upon a roadway except for the purpose of crossing the road,” but no warnings have issued for violation of this bylaw at this point.
In the meantime, Carmichael Greb says she is hosting a road safety meeting on Tuesday night.
“We have put together a group of citizens across the ward to discuss issues of street safety … I want to see from residents are their out-of-the-box ways we can keep our streets safe.”
With files from Mark McAllister
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