By
Ben SpurrTransportation Reporter
Mon., Jan. 16, 2017
Toronto’s red-light camera program is headed for a major expansion, a year after the devices appear to have resulted in a record number of charges against drivers.
Last week, Toronto officials announced plans that could see the number of cameras, currently installed at 77 locations across the city, effectively doubled. The expansion is being billed as part of the city’s new $80-million road safety plan, which Mayor John Tory has championed with the aim of eliminating traffic deaths and serious injuries.
“I think the objective here is to get people to slow down and drive safely in school zones,
seniors zones, places like that, to stop this carnage that’s been happening on the roads and to get (the number of traffic deaths) down to zero,” Tory said at a press conference last Tuesday, speaking in support of the cameras.
Last year, 77 drivers, car passengers,
pedestrians and cyclists were killed on Toronto’s streets, the highest number of traffic fatalities in more than a decade.
According to city transportation data obtained by the Star, the red-light cameras, which allow authorities to remotely catch and ticket drivers who run red lights, were on track last year to net the most charges in any year since the program began.
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Michael Black, co-founder of pedestrian advocacy group
Walk Toronto, said the money the cameras generate is definitely a plus.
“The beauty of safety cameras is they’re very effective and they also pay for themselves,” he said.
Black argued there are many elements of the road safety plan, which includes lower speed limits and turning prohibitions, that “simply won’t work without enforcement,” and that automated technology is the best way to make sure drivers follow the rules. A single camera can monitor an intersection much more effectively than a police officer — and at significantly lower cost.
Elliott Silverstein, manager of government relations for the
Canadian Automobile Association’s South Central Ontario chapter, said more than 70 per cent of its members support the use of red-light cameras.
But Silverstein said the support is conditional on the cameras’ use as a safety measure and not a revenue stream. Funds collected from the cameras should be reinvested into safety initiatives, he argued, and the expansion of the program should be accompanied by public education efforts.
Lewis Smith, a spokesperson for the
Canada Safety Council, said cities can combat the perception that cameras are a cash grab by giving drivers ample warning of where the devices are. In Toronto, all intersections that have cameras are signed.
“The important thing for cities to do, if the main goal is really prevention as opposed to punishment after the fact, is to make it very clear that there’s a red-light camera there,” Smith said.