[lenaitch]

The fix for Birchmount and Danforth is easy and quick. On Monday morning put out concrete barriers so it's only one lane each way. Reduce the speed to 40 km an hour because it's a school zone. Interestingly, so far the van driver has not been charged with dangerous driving. I wonder if the victim was cycling on the walk path or crossed against the light - not victim blaming, but curious as to the facts.

Today I was driving south on Sackville St. towards Gerrard. I had the green but I always slow here because I’ve seen trucks run the red. Just as I approach Gerrard a cyclist crosses against the red light directly in my path. I stop and toot the horn, and the young woman cyclist looks bewildered and carries on. I’m not sure how the road and this intersection could be made safer.

Obviously, we don't know the evidence that has and likely continues to be gathered. The revised offence of Dangerous Driving under the Criminal Code is deceptively straight forward:

Everyone commits an offence who operates a conveyance in a manner that, having regard to all of the circumstances, is dangerous to the public.​

but the body of case law as to what constitutes it (actually, the previously-worded offence) is fairly extensive. At its most basic level, it can boil down to advertent vs. inadvertent; i.e. the mental element (mens rea' - guilty mind). When considering elements of the offence, the term 'marked departure from the reasonable standard of care' (R. v Roy) needs to be considered. It's actions (or inactions) that would be on trial, not the outcome. The outcome in this instance enters the picture only from the perspective of which subsection to use.

 

[gabe]

Speeding Mercedes collides with TTC bus, five sent to hospital, police say​

Multiple injured, one critically, in crash involving TTC bus, another vehicle

One person is in critical condition following a late-night crash in North York. Police say just before 11:30 p.m. Friday, a black Mercedes was going at a high rate of speed westbound on Wilson Avenue near Bathurst Street when the driver lost control and entered the eastbound lanes, crashing into...

toronto.citynews.ca

An 18-year-old driver is in life-threatening condition following a collision with a TTC bus near Wilson Avenue late Friday night, Toronto police say.

Officers responded to reports of a collision involving a bus and a Mercedes car on Wilson near King High Avenue, near Allen Road and the 401, at about 11:19 p.m.

Police say the driver of a black Mercedes was speeding westbound on Wilson before he lost control while entering the eastbound lanes, and collided with an eastbound bus.


The driver of the car was taken to hospital with life-threatening injuries. Meanwhile, three other passengers of the Mercedes along with the bus driver were taken to hospital with non-life-threatening injuries, police added.

There are no reports of any injury caused to passengers of the TTC bus yet, police said.

This could have been catastrophic if this idiot hit a car full of people. if this guy lives, he should get permanent driving ban for excessive speeding.

It is too easy to get a drivers license. We definitely need stricter licensing and testing

 

[Admiral Beez]

I wonder what’s changed in the mentality of drivers. Or are there just more of us, making a consistent ratio of idiots just more noticeable?

 

[picard102]

Speeding Mercedes collides with TTC bus, five sent to hospital, police say​

Multiple injured, one critically, in crash involving TTC bus, another vehicle

One person is in critical condition following a late-night crash in North York. Police say just before 11:30 p.m. Friday, a black Mercedes was going at a high rate of speed westbound on Wilson Avenue near Bathurst Street when the driver lost control and entered the eastbound lanes, crashing into...

toronto.citynews.ca

This could have been catastrophic if this idiot hit a car full of people. if this guy lives, he should get permanent driving ban for excessive speeding.

It is too easy to get a drivers license. We definitely need stricter licensing and testing

It was pretty catastrophic with the bus. Seemed like a kid with their parents car and friends.

 

[lenaitch]

Speeding Mercedes collides with TTC bus, five sent to hospital, police say​

Multiple injured, one critically, in crash involving TTC bus, another vehicle

One person is in critical condition following a late-night crash in North York. Police say just before 11:30 p.m. Friday, a black Mercedes was going at a high rate of speed westbound on Wilson Avenue near Bathurst Street when the driver lost control and entered the eastbound lanes, crashing into...

toronto.citynews.ca

This could have been catastrophic if this idiot hit a car full of people. if this guy lives, he should get permanent driving ban for excessive speeding.

It is too easy to get a drivers license. We definitely need stricter licensing and testing

Not just a Toronto problem it seems:

Boy, 15, killed, six teens hurt in pickup truck rollover north of the city

A 15-year-old Sunderland boy was killed and six other teenagers injured when a pickup truck rolled over north of the city early Sunday.

torontosun.com

and in a headline that had a scary deja-vu:

Miramichi hockey team involved in fatal bus highway collision on way to Fredericton game - New Brunswick | Globalnews.ca

The driver of the car succumbed to injuries, while those on the bus sustained limited injuries. Grief counsellors have been brought in, said the MHL.

globalnews.ca

 

[Northern Light]

Vision Zero Improvements are coming to the Symes Road, Terry Drive and Orman Avenue area.

Road diets, Reduced Turning Radii and New sidewalks:

'

Construction due to begin next year (2022)

Road Safety Improvements: Symes, Orman & Hilldale

The City of Toronto is planning several road safety improvements that are ongoing as part of upcoming road reconstruction, road resurfacing and watermain replacement work on Symes Road, Orman Avenue and Hilldale Road. Work began in Fall 2023, after the additional slope stability assessments were...

www.toronto.ca

 

[tiffer24]

https://twitter.com/x/status/1452977807156555781

 

[tiffer24]

https://twitter.com/x/status/1453345508001521664

 

[Admiral Beez]

I am quite happy to see enforcement used ahead of more concrete redesign (double meaning intended). Suppose there were a general speed limit through signalled intersections of 50 km/hr on arterial roads. Accelerate between intersections if you please, but you must slow through intersections. Enforce that with cameras….. current red light cameras only scratch the surface because if you speed up and race the yellow, you beat the red and are not be detected, but your driving style is equally aggressive.

Speed limits don't work because there's no enforcement. We have over 5,000 TPS officers in this city and excluding those on paid duty at construction sites you can drive all day and never see one. Speed cameras only work if you have signage declaring their presence, and not hypothetical, might be a fake camera silliness, but real cameras. If the speed cameras are hidden they become more about revenue than deterrence and enforcement.

The killing at Birchmount was from a driver coming south on Birchmount and turning left onto Danforth. I don't know how the driver missed seeing the pedestrian as the sight lines are totally clear. But a speed limit on Danforth wouldn't help, since the driver was on Birchmount until the last moment.

 

[crs1026]

Speed limits don't work because there's no enforcement. We have over 5,000 TPS officers in this city and excluding those on paid duty at construction sites you can drive all day and never see one. Speed cameras only work if you have signage declaring their presence, and not hypothetical, might be a fake camera silliness, but real cameras. If the speed cameras are hidden they become more about revenue than deterrence and enforcement.

I’m actually a fan of using technology rather than relying on officers - partly for cost and partly because they work better. I would not want a police cruiser attempting to catch up with an aggressive lane-weaving idiot…. now you have two vehicles driving dangerously instead of one.

I don’t see why cars can’t be equipped to “rat out” their drivers using some combination of auditory/visual alarms, data recording, and telemetry. Many already record the data against a catastrophic event. Given appropriate safeguards, there are no real Big Brother obstacles. And if driving is a privilege not a right….. well, trust but verify say I.

My solution to the cash grab concern is simple - allow convicted motorists to pay some or all of their fine to a registered charity of their choice. Or simply record demerit points and immediately notify insurers.

I was disappointed to see that a very effective photo radar unit located in my general area shifted to a new (but equally deserving) location recently. It will be interesting to see if drivers resume their old habits as they notice that it’s gone. Some local residents recently asked if they could crowdsource a photo radar unit for the neighbourhood. IMHO that would be far more constructive than everyone putting “Slow Down” signs on their lawns. It’s not a watchdog unless it can bite.

The killing at Birchmount was from a driver coming south on Birchmount and turning left onto Danforth. I don't know how the driver missed seeing the pedestrian as the sight lines are totally clear. But a speed limit on Danforth wouldn't help, since the driver was on Birchmount until the last moment.

Setting aside the needless hyperbole (failure of intended safety barriers leading to death and “killing” are two different outcomes in my vocabulary) - and declining to speculate about this specific incident - it has been proven repeatedly in many types of studies that people in many settings and tasks fail to sense or react to critical things that are in plain sight.

Left turns are a particularly haste-provoking scenario for motorists because the driver may perceive opportunities to turn that are only temporary and demand immediate action, usually involving prompt acceleration. Where there is no left turn lane, the motorist who stops and waits for a clear path is at risk from following vehicles approaching at speed. The obvious wisdom - don’t turn unless you have high confidence that the path is clear and will continue to be clear - gets mangled in the heat of the moment, and gets unlearned over time as drivers repeat risky moves that succeed. No amount of judging or blaming will correct this - the task needs to be redesigned or changed in some way. And then reeducated.

If we are going to fix pedestrian safety we need to know the root causes and not assume that drivers are already in an environment that is already optimised to be error-free. Maybe in this case the driver is culpable, or maybe in the extreme, left turns should only happen with a green arrow.

- Paul

PS - I find myself wondering if driving is just too complicated a task for the average human brain….. too many competing stimuli. Slowing the process down seems to be the one mitigating action that creates greater likelihood of processing it all. Flying is complicated but Airplane pilots mostly only focus on a carefully organised panel that parses the parameters for them…..they don’t spend much time trying to spot danger. Motorists juggle more mental balls.

 

[evandyk]

I was disappointed to see that a very effective photo radar unit located in my general area shifted to a new (but equally deserving) location recently. It will be interesting to see if drivers resume their old habits as they notice that it’s gone. Some local residents recently asked if they could crowdsource a photo radar unit for the neighbourhood. IMHO that would be far more constructive than everyone putting “Slow Down” signs on their lawns. It’s not a watchdog unless it can bite.

They have to do this because Toronto's program, rather than relying on evidence or best practice for camera placement, requires an equal number of cameras to be located in each ward in the city. So they can't just put cameras everywhere that they are most effective (though I suspect that with only 50 in use, you can find a pretty deserving spot for all of them).

https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/toronto/toronto-automated-speed-enforcement-cameras-rotation-1.6046358

"The city first installed its cameras in December 2019 in community safety zones near schools as part of its Vision Zero plan to eliminate traffic-related fatalities. Two units — 50 in total — were placed in each ward with the ability to record licence plates and mail out tickets to speeders."

 

[tiffer24]

https://twitter.com/x/status/1453412081924022279

 

[Admiral Beez]

PS - I find myself wondering if driving is just too complicated a task for the average human brain….. too many competing stimuli.

People drive tens of millions of miles a year. I've been driving and motorcycling since 1988 and have never hit anyone or anything. We just have to slow down and GAF about our fellow citizens - that’s what’s changed in the past decade or so.

That said, I can almost guarantee that had the concept of driving been thought of today that big government health and safety would have rejected it. The idea that I can ride my 1982 Suzuki at speed without any system or government oversight, behavioural or location tracking, relying on my adherence to the rules and upon my training and wits to keep me and everyone else safe is anathema to what government wants to become.

In this respect I am glad to have been born in the early 1970s, to have known what it was like to live without a smart phone, without a computer, the internet, Google maps or location tracking, without (soon to come) nanny state CCT cameras and behaviour compliance enforcement everywhere. Be wary of government encroaching on our lives in the name of safety and security.

Instead of speed cameras everywhere (they do have a place) I propose that we change the road designs. Put in roundabouts, install sharp 90 degree curbs at intersections, use hardened curbs not paint to suggest bike lanes. Smarter people than me know what’s needed to slow traffic and make it safer, let’s do it.

 

[evandyk]

That said, I can almost guarantee that had the concept of driving been thought of today that big government health and safety would have rejected it.

Given that driving is the leading cause of death for young, healthy people, I would hope so! Or at least adopted a very different version of it.

 

[Admiral Beez]

Given that driving is the leading cause of death for young, healthy people, I would hope so! Or at least adopted a very different version of it.

The different version government has envisioned for us is one where you don't control and likely don't own a vehicle at all. Instead when you want to go somewhere a government-control autonomous taxi will pick you up and take you to where you want to go, all the while tracking where you went and likely through the RFID tags, what you bought (Statistics Canada and CRA needs to know). It's safer for sure, more young people will live to die by the second leading cause of death, themselves. But that is the greater good.

But if you haven't driven a car or ridden a motorcycle across the top of Lake Superior or just across the countryside above Toronto, without any controls or much safety beyond your own wits and trust in your fellows, you don't know the freedom that we're all so willing to surrender to the government. I know the world is changing, we demand an overseeing, all-knowing state to protect us, and I'll accept the consensus, but I remain glad that I lived much of my life beforehand.