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A battle is on for the soul of Elgin Street, between the people who run the businesses that line it and the customers who patronize them.

Elgin is due for a major reconstruction and the city’s trying to work out how best to divide it among all the people who want to use it — pedestrians, drivers and cyclists, merchants and residents and customers and people just passing through. They’ve had public consultations, surveys, write-in questionnaires, the results of which are difficult.

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The No. 1 comment from everyone, all thrown into a big pile: Widen the sidewalks. No. 2: Add bike lanes or tracks. No. 3: Plant street trees. No. 4: More patios.

Lovely to imagine, but how could this work?

Except at its north and south ends where it’s wider, Elgin is four narrow lanes across, with street parking taking up two of those lanes. Short of slicing off the fronts of buildings, any changes will be zero-sum: anything added for cyclists or pedestrians has to come out of the road, with the lanes primarily used for parking being the first to go. Could be one lane, could be both. Each side has about 50 spaces between Lisgar Street and the 417 overpass, by the city’s count. About 70 of the total are on the super-tight commercial strip, where they’ve been carefully protected.