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Veteran bike cop, cycling advocate honoured for his role in changing the game for Toronto cyclists

At Wednesday night's Toronto Bike Awards, a pioneer in both city cycling and law enforcement was honoured. That pioneer was Const. Hugh Smith.

February 25, 2016
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At Wednesday night’s Toronto Bike Awards, a pioneer in both city cycling and law enforcement was honoured. That pioneer was Const. Hugh Smith, one of the city’s first bike cops and most authoritative cycling advocates, who was recognized for the profound, lasting impact he made—and continues to make—on the city’s cycling community with Cycle Toronto‘s Lifetime Achievement Award.

As Metro News reported, Smith “changed the conversation” when it comes to cycling in Canada’s biggest city.

When he first rolled out in the saddle of a Toronto police bike nearly three decades ago, the unit—now a common sight on the streets, even more so than squad cars in some places—was remarkably bare-bones compared to its 2016 version. Officers, Metro News describes, weren’t even issued bike shorts the way they are today. Instead, they improvised. Standard uniform pants became cut-offs, something Smith described as “[not] exactly comfortable.”

But while the city’s bike police unit was somewhat slap-dash in its earliest form, its success quickly became evident, and it had everything to do with how the officers got around. Instead of anonymously cruising past behind the windshield of a car, police officers were on the ground, mixing more visibly—and with greater engagement—among Toronto residents. The interactions that resulted, Smith said, speaking with Metro News, were vastly more positive.

“We’d be stopped at an intersection and people would just come up and talk to us. We weren’t this big blue machine stuck inside a car,” he said.

This year, Smith finally retires from the Toronto Police, capping off a successful, meaningful career that he started in the early 1980s. Even before he rolled out at the vanguard of bike-mounted law enforcement, though, cycling was an essential part of Hugh’s life, and his expertise as a rider has been passed on to generations of young cops that followed. In all, more than 1,000 officers, whether part of the bike unit or not, have received his training. That training has also made him a valued advocate of Toronto cycling, his knowledge instrumental in reminding motorists that cyclists are entitled to the whole lane, for example.

His advocacy was especially noted in 2009, when cyclists were accused of waging a so-called “war on cars”—a common refrain of former mayor Rob Ford’s tenure. Putting a pin in some of the worst things said about cyclists at the time, Smith told the Toronto Star, “A cyclist has the right to an entire lane, even though they only occupy a part of it. And it’s up to them to dictate when they want to share.”

As he hangs up his bike cop’s helmet this year, Smith is optimistic about how cycling has changed since the days when the words ‘squish you off the curb’ haunted Toronto riders. Still, city cycling isn’t out of the woods yet, he told the CBC, citing basic problems with communication among road users. “Coming out to make a right turn,” he aid, “if the cyclist is on your right for predominantly 90 percent of that street, and you want to go up and make a right turn, there’s no real communication sometimes. That’s where we get these conflicts.”

To be honoured by the city’s leading bike advocacy group, he also told the CBC, is a “humbling” recognition of his own efforts.

“It’s very humbling as a police officer to have that platform,” Smith told CBC’s Metro Morning,, a local Toronto radio show, “to make positive changes and look where we are today: it’s not the cars (versus) bikes, it’s how we can move together instead of ‘we don’t want you on the road.'”