In a year of coming to the aid of dogs and cats, it was bike riders who sunk their teeth into The Fixer's leg.

Of all the problems we took on in 2011, helping Roscoe the disabled pug get a new wheelchair after his was stolen easily qualifies as the most gratifying fix.

The 6-year-old pug's hindquarters are disabled, but his tiny, custom-made wheelchair allowed him to propel himself by his front legs, until a lowdown dog swiped it from the porch of his home.

Our Oct. 13 column unleashed a torrent of outrage and sympathy from readers. Many offered cash to buy Roscoe another chair, while a reader in Montreal said he'd build the bereft dog a new one.

Tanya Jones, who also had a disabled pug that had passed away, hooked up with Roscoe's owner to pass along a chair she no longer needed, which was later replaced by one that was an even better fit, from dog trainer Marlo Hiltz.

But trying to save the feral cat colony at Bluffers Park, which had been there for many years, was not so successful.

They were preyed on by coyotes, despite a nightly vigil by their caretakers, and were finally rounded up and moved to a temporary home, which turned out to be no blessing to them.

We've always tried to advocate for cyclists, but when we strayed from that path last June and suggested they follow the rules of the road more closely, bike riders bared their fangs.

Hundreds of comments were posted to our online stories, many from cyclists who said the rules were made to be broken, at least by them, and that they'd ride wherever and however they damned well pleased.

Never have we been subjected to such insulting righteousness, from riders who questioned our credentials, said we were too old to know how to ride a bike and threatened to punch us in the face.

It ranks as one of the proudest episodes in our seven years as The Fixer.

Our numbers for 2011 weren't quite as good as in 2010, but were still among the highest ever for helping fix problems that are the responsibility of government and its agencies.

Of the 230 problems we reported on this year, 204 were fixed, a success rate of 88 per cent, off by just a tick from the 89 per cent we achieved in 2010.

As of Dec. 27, we received 1,747 emails from readers asking for assistance, down from 1,860 in 2010 but still higher than in 2009, while phone calls totaled 1,283, down from 1,380 last year.

Phone calls have slowly been declining for several years, while emails have increased, which reflects a trend on the part of readers to rely more heavily on computers and the Internet as a preferred form of communication.

A total of 3,030 calls and emails arrived in 2011, down from 3,240 in 2010 but still a reassuring indication that readers regard us as a viable alternative to reporting problems via the city's 311 phone service.

But comments posted to our online stories grew in leaps and bounds.

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Readers use these as an alternative to calling or emailing. We hope to provide many more opportunities for readers to comment on stories in 2012.

Among the disappointments of 2011, our inability to shame those responsible for the appalling litter around a huge community mailbox on City View Blvd. in Vaughan tops the list.

We reported in mid-November on ankle-deep ad flyers that were tossed to the ground by people too lazy and indifferent to take their junk mail home and recycle it.

If it wasn't for cleanup efforts by PowerStream employees, who work near the mailbox and regularly volunteer their lunch break to clean up the mess, the junk mail might be knee-deep.

We also reported last spring on the scourge of paper shredding trucks that set up in the curb lanes of busy downtown streets — sometimes during rush hour — and block traffic in the noble cause of turning paper into confetti.

Other than an occasional parking ticket, the shredding trucks continue to snarl downtown traffic with little consequence, which counts as another disappointment.

We've worked to rehabilitate ourselves with the cycling set by going to bat for them on infrastructure problems and riding our own bike with cyclists who advocate for them, to see things from their point of view.

One of our goals for 2012 is to encourage a better relationship between drivers and cyclists, the goal of the I Share the Road campaign started by cycling blogger James Schwartz, which we wrote about last fall.

It won't be easy, but everyone will be the better for it.

What's broken in your neighbourhood? Wherever you are in Greater Toronto, we want to know. To email us, go to www.thestar.com/thefixer and click on the submit a problem link. Or call us at 416-869-4823.