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Road Safety & Vision Zero Plan

crs1026 said:
I'm not so sure this is workable. I sure don't want the customs officers at the border feeling the need to pop more trunks in case someone is smuggling in aftermarket car parts. That may be desirable when they suspect drug or weapons smuggling, but there are limits.
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Honestly, if someone wants to smuggle in illegal license plate covers, let them go for it :p Theres not a lot of money to be made here. Just cutting out legal sellers will kill the vast majority of the market. I don’t see this as a particularly compelling objection.

crs1026 said:
The issue in enforcement is not police being "untrustable" - it's the reality that they are too busy. And traffic stops are generally unsafe, so police officers have to make decisions whether the risk and time and paperwork is appropriate for the offence. That's why I would like to see license plate enforcement handed off to others, not as a slight to the police but to recognize the realities of what they can and can't attend to.
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Maybe it’s both. There are publicized instances of police acting above the law. That aside, I’m curious why you think if police find traffic stops dangerous and not worth their time - why another department would feel differently? Do stops become more safe if someone other than a police officer does it?

EDIT: I am supportive of your proposition of removing road safety work from the police.
 
My comment about police not taking the time comes in part from direct comments from officers who patrol the 401 - who have told me that particularly at night, there has to be a very good reason before they will risk a traffic stop. Even with all those lights, a car parked on the shoulder is a sitting duck to get hit by some inattentive motorist - and as well, motorists who see flashing lights in the mirror don’t always pull over in a calm, careful way, shoulders may be soft or narrow etc. They certainly go after drivers doing patently unsafe things like stunt driving, no lights, etc - but not the small stuff - or so I have been told.
- Paul
 
Just send some sort of provincial offence officers to walk through the parking lots of every mall and have them mail tickets to the owners of any car with obscured plates. You don't need to make risky highway stops to crack down on this.

And do tinted windows too while they're at it.
 
I am reminded of the New Brunswick Highway Patrol. Back in the late 1970s, the Province got into some snit with the RCMP and decided to form their own highway patrol - unarmed. That was fine until one was murdered on the side of the road. If you set up an enforcement agency that stops vehicles (as opposed to say, a parking authority) they face the same risk as the police, would need to be similarly equipped, and any labour lawyer worth his salt would successfully argue that they should be paid the same. All that to essentially do one thing. They would be extremely limited in criminal law enforcement (drinking-driving, drugs, etc.).

crs1026 said:
My comment about police not taking the time comes in part from direct comments from officers who patrol the 401 - who have told me that particularly at night, there has to be a very good reason before they will risk a traffic stop. Even with all those lights, a car parked on the shoulder is a sitting duck to get hit by some inattentive motorist - and as well, motorists who see flashing lights in the mirror don’t always pull over in a calm, careful way, shoulders may be soft or narrow etc. They certainly go after drivers doing patently unsafe things like stunt driving, no lights, etc - but not the small stuff - or so I have been told.
- Paul
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That is true, and has been for years. The general public has no idea how dangerous it is out there, particularly at night. IN the GTA in particular, narrow shoulders, speed, density, inattention, plain lousy drivers all contribute. Peculiarities of the 400-series highways aside, the 'routine traffic stop' is probably the most dangerous interaction a police officer can face.

evandyk said:
Just send some sort of provincial offence officers to walk through the parking lots of every mall and have them mail tickets to the owners of any car with obscured plates. You don't need to make risky highway stops to crack down on this.

And do tinted windows too while they're at it.
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Seeing as that is private property, it is a non-starter.
 
If they handle infractions like parking tickets, i.e. they're just making you pay versus it being counted against your insurance, then I can live with that.
 
The City has a preferred option for changes to Galloway Road in Scarborough.

The bulk of the change is the addition of sidewalks to both sides of the road (currently intermittent) as well as buffered, painted, bike lanes. There would also be some geometric improvements at intersections, and some minor streetscaping moves.

The presentation is here:


If approved, implementation is hoped for in 2025.

From the above:

1705585808499.png




1705585775656.png

1705585728659.png



1705585871659.png


My Comments:

While physically separated bike lanes would be nice; as would continuous blvds between the sidewalk and the road; I understand the desire to mitigate against people railing when the City reclaims part of their front lawns/driveways. In the real would, this is a substantial improvement vs the status quo. I'll take it.
 
This isn't new, but was going around Twitter yesterday, and I hadn't seen it before:

jalopnik.com

Traffic Fatalities Are Up Almost Everywhere, But Hoboken Hasn't Had One In Nearly 7 Years

Hoboken seems to have somehow cracked the code to preventing traffic deaths
jalopnik.com jalopnik.com

Despite lots of foot traffic, and considerable four-wheeled traffic, the city hasn’t seen a single traffic death since January 2017, and according to Bloomberg, traffic injuries are down about 40 percent in that same period. Mayor Ravi Bhalla’s ‘Vision Zero’ executive order, a campaign to completely eliminate traffic deaths, has proven its worth in keeping Hobokenites alive.
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It's a pretty small city, but that's impressive.
 
allengeorge said:
Some important context: Hoboken is _tiny_. Like 5 km2 tiny. Still, quite impressive.
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Hoboken's population is about 60k.

Toronto has about 50 road user deaths per year, or 1.6 per 100k population.

www.toronto.ca

Fatalities - Vision Zero

No loss of life as a result of traffic collisions is acceptable in a Vision Zero approach. Fatalities amongst pedestrians have seen a small drop in the past few years compared to 2016, when traffic fatalities hit a 10-year record high of 78. Addressing road safety continues to be a priority for...
www.toronto.ca www.toronto.ca

At a similar rate, Hoboken should be seeing 1 death per year. Zero deaths in 6 years is indeed impressive.

And mostly simple measures. Just a little bit of political will.

I would say the perception of safety is almost worth more than the actual reduction in road deaths. More perceived safety means more active transportation, less congestion, pollution and so on.
 
Hoboken eliminating traffic fatalities:

While Hoboken’s plan has numerous components, including lower speed limits and staggered traffic lights, daylighting is often credited as one of the biggest reasons its fatalities have dropped to zero.

Ryan Sharp, the city’s transportation director, said when roads need to be repaved, Hoboken takes the additional step of cordoning off the street corners to widen curbs and shorten crosswalks. It’s already illegal to park at an intersection in Hoboken, but drivers often do anyway if there aren’t physical barriers.

Some of the new concrete structures are equipped with bike racks, benches and even rain garden planters that help absorb stormwater runoff. If there isn’t enough money for an infrastructure solution right away, the city puts up temporary bollards.

“There really isn’t a silver bullet or any magic, innovative thing where we’ve cracked a code,” Sharp said. “Our approach has been more about focusing on the fundamentals. We’ve created a program where we’re layering these things in year after year.”
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fortune.com

America’s 4th-densest city has wiped out traffic fatalities by taking a page from Sweden and eliminating parking spots

The death of an 89-year-old pedestrian in 2017 was the last straw for the mayor of Hoboken, N.J. "“I felt it wasn’t acceptable."
fortune.com fortune.com
 
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