This past summer, on Danforth Avenue, a municipal miracle occurred.

With the support of non-profit urbanist group 8 80 Cities and local Coun. Brad Bradford, two lanes of traffic between Woodbine and Woodmount avenues were temporarily removed and replaced with protected bike lanes, wider pedestrian routes, expanded restaurant patios and even some space for kids to do on-street arts and crafts.

The project was cool — too bad it was temporary — but that wasn’t the miraculous part. The miracle was that it all happened fast.

Really fast.

With some paint, planters, barriers and elbow grease, it took less than a day to make a street dramatically safer and more welcoming.

The speed was notable, because almost nothing happens quickly in this city.

When Toronto council meets this week, their agenda will be littered with items moving slower than a streetcar through a film festival.

A package of bike lanes approved in 2016 is set to just now get the technical approvals they need to get construction started.

And light a candle for poor Coun. Joe Cressy. He’s assembled a list of seven council-approved road safety improvements — one approved as far back as 2015 — for the CityPlace neighbourhood that have still yet to be implemented.

Meanwhile, a report about the road safety plan recommends against moving forward with a strategy to install traffic signals at the approximately 2,700 TTC stops that don’t offer safe crossing nearby. That task, the report says, would take over 50 years to complete.

I know building a better city isn’t easy, but does it really have to take this long?

The summer’s miracle on Danforth suggests it doesn’t. At the very least, that project shows that it’s possible to make immediate change with temporary materials that can make a real difference. These interim projects can do the job while bureaucrats design permanent solutions.

Downtown’s King Street transit pilot offers more evidence showing fast is possible. That project could have been held up for years if the city had decided to jump straight to talking about permanent alterations to the street. Instead, they implemented it with a bunch of concrete barriers and temporary signage.

At an initial cost of just $1.5 million and with results showing a sustained improvement in reliability and travel times for 84,000 daily riders, it’s the most cost-effective transit improvement project in Toronto’s history.

And it happened fast.

Toronto could do more projects like this. Money certainly isn’t a barrier. In recent years, council has approved more and more cash for initiatives like road safety and transit. The trouble is that departments are slow to spend it.

According to figures reported to last month’s budget committee meeting, city hall’s transportation services department was on track to spend just $44 million of the $58 million allocated for safety projects like traffic calming, traffic light installation and new sidewalks this year. They’re leaving about a quarter of their budget on the table.

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It’s a similar story with the TTC, where the agency projected it would spend just 64 per cent of the $207 million it budgeted for service improvements in 2019.

In a city crying out for safer streets and better transit, it’s odd that these departments are having trouble spending their budgets. But infrastructure projects out of city hall face a slew of hurdles before anything can happen: interminable public meetings, endless consultant studies, and constant changes to the scope and timing.

It shouldn’t take a miracle to break free of this process and actually achieve results quickly. With Premier Doug Ford’s government taking on responsibility for long-term transit projects, Toronto council should refocus on delivering short-term results, even if they come in the form of pilots or interim measures. Break down barriers and embrace projects that can be implemented in days, not years. Feel the need — it’s a need for speed.