TORONTO — To your already overflowing "Reasons to Avoid Toronto" file, add this: City Council has just passed a one-minute idling law. It’ll probably come into force in the fall.

It has been against the law to idle three minutes or more for some time now, but last week, councillors expanded the rule in their efforts to “shift people out of cars.”

The new bylaw was introduced last week, it will undergo a few amendments and return to council for a vote probably in July, and then come into affect about a month after that.

So why the change? Well, this could have something to do with it: In 2009, only 88 tickets were handed out to three-minute idlers, but giving the city’s parking police authority to issue citations, in the amount of $125, to any scofflaw who dares let his engine run longer than 60 seconds will surly provide cash-strapped Hogtown more revenue.

(Any guesses whether the G-20 leaders’ limos will idle more than three minutes? We’re giving odds they won’t get tickets though.)

A spokesperson for the City of Toronto told todaystrucking.com that exemptions will be made for trucks that qualify as "mobile workshops;" i.e., "vehicles whose primary function is not driving, but operations of equipment [for example, aerial lifts or safety lights] can idle as long as the purpose is to operate the auxiliary equipment."

The previous idling law did not apply to buses but the new one does. (So, drivers, assumingly, will have to turn off their buses when they leave passengers starring at their watches while they run into Timmies for a coffee).

And there’s no more loophole allowing for exceptions in extremely hot or very cold weather, either.

Jas Shoker is president of the HGC Transport Group, a reefer fleet based in Brampton. (And in fact is celebrating the opening of a brand-new facility today)

When he heard of the new one-minute law, he said "it’s just another way to make drivers’ lives harder. More drivers are going to quit."