The most eye-catching bicycle on Dundas Street West has won a reprieve.
Caroline Macfarlane said she had no idea what buzz she would create by spray painting a long-abandoned bicycle outside the Ontario College of Art and Design Student Gallery.But not long after Macfarlane and friend Vanessa Nicholas had remade the old bike into a piece of neon art, the City of Toronto showed up.The bike, Macfarlane learned through a removal notice, had to go.After outpouring of support, including from city councillors Adam Vaughan and Gary Crawford, however, the bylaw enforcers have backed off.They told Macfarlane the bike won't be destroyed if she left it locked to a city bike post past Monday, June 6.As of Tuesday, the neon bike is still there, and Macfarlane said both Crawford and Vaughan are trying to find it a more permanent home.She said she's surprised and pleased by this turn of events. "It shows there is a real hunger for more art," said Macfarlane, who would like to decorate more abandoned bicycles in the same way.Vaughan, representing a downtown ward, has been critical of the city's actions, linking them to Mayor Rob Ford's aggressive campaign against graffiti.Crawford embraced the neon bike a different way, calling it "a symbol of creativity that can inspire Toronto" and calling for people to post other "ideas for creative change in Toronto" to his Facebook page or Twitter account (www.twitter.com/cllrcrawford).Known to many of his Scarborough constituents as a painter before he became a councillor last fall, Crawford met Mcfarlane and Nicholas and said their neon bike was "absolutely brilliant" because it turned an eyesore into something beautiful."It became something people noticed," he said Friday. "We need more people like that."But Crawford had to admit there is a contradiction in a city that encourages people to be creative with their surroundings and then tries to remove their work. "We have to grapple with this as a city," he said, adding maybe it's time for a change in thinking.The colour of the bike has been a mystery in itself, variously described as pink or orange. Macfarlane, who has been updating the story on a blog she shares with Nicholas (http://blogthegood.tumblr.com), described it as an in-between colour, looking more pink on the can and more orange in the sunlight.