Road design, safety and Vision Zero

[Acitta]

I think this was in reference to carrying children. There's social pressure...also technical pressure...I cannot physically fit the stupidly giant car seat in a subcompact car. Owning a larger vehicle is certainly expected.

And FWIW when it comes to cars and transportation, I don't think any of us are normal

With parents today (and overbearing grandparents) I think you’d get a fair amount of pushback/questions if you tried to jam kids into a modern Corolla or Civic. Somehow you absolutely need that SUV in 2023 parenting circles and anything else is bordering on neglect.

My parents managed to cram three boys into a not particularly large car in the 1960s. There was no such thing as a minivan back then.

[danbrotherston]

I will say there is a difference in regulation though, car seats are required for much longer, and car seats have ballooned in size. You'd be hard pressed to fit two of todays car seats in a Ford Tempo and even with my sister and I being 3 years apart, you'd still need two full size car seats which my parents never had.

I know nothing about car seats and how big they have to be! But I wonder if the focus on getting kids in car seats for longer is an example of focussing on a single criterion and not considering the safety/usability picture. Of course they are safer, all else being equal, but they also can't go anywhere?

I think car seats themselves make sense, and admittedly they do make more sense now. Or rather, cars are safer now--for occupants anyway--but children would not benefit from those same improvements without using a car/booster seat because the restraint systems in the vehicles are not designed for them and their effectiveness depends on the size of the occupant.

Or more concretely, when my mom drove me in her Ford Tempo, all we had were lap belts and no airbags. Those were just as effective protecting my mom in a crash as 5 year old me. But today our vehicle has auto-retracting three-point belts along with side impact air bags. Those are not effective in protecting a 5 year old, so it makes sense that they need some kind of adapter to improve safety (to match that of other occupants).

But the seats do not need to be the ridiculous things we have here.

More over, I think for most children, they don't really lose much, if you live somewhere that you must be driven everywhere, your parents probably own a car, putting a car seat in it and keeping it there doesn't restrict mobility much over that already massive restriction. I know it has affected me, but I know we're a pretty extreme outlier.

What it does probably do is put additional obstacles in the way of improving our transportation policy and habits.

That being said, it is certainly an issue of car blindness that our government regulates that children must use car seats, but doesn't regulate that you should be able to see a child standing in front of your vehicle. I.e., the only children's lives who matter are the ones *IN* the car.

[plam]

More over, I think for most children, they don't really lose much, if you live somewhere that you must be driven everywhere, your parents probably own a car, putting a car seat in it and keeping it there doesn't restrict mobility much over that already massive restriction. I know it has affected me, but I know we're a pretty extreme outlier.

What it does probably do is put additional obstacles in the way of improving our transportation policy and habits.

Yeah, it makes it difficult to change from the (now) status quo to a less car heavy one, or one where not so many people own their own cars, which might lead to less driving overall.

[tomh009]

Really? My personal observations (nb anecdotal evidence only!) suggest that people (with money to buy new/newish cars) will buy the kind of vehicles they like. Some people like SUVs/crossovers, some like compact hatchbacks, some bigger sedans, others pickup trucks and yet others minivans. Of course some people will want to have more expensive cars to show off, but I don't think that's necessarily correlated with size. (Full disclosure: we own a hatchback.)

Or am I missing something?

I think this was in reference to carrying children. There's social pressure...also technical pressure...I cannot physically fit the stupidly giant car seat in a subcompact car. Owning a larger vehicle is certainly expected.

Back in the day there were three of us kids in the back seat of a VW Rabbit when we went on vacation ...

More seriously, apparently there are narrower car seat available. I even stumbled onto web sites that tested getting three of them in a car's back seat.

[jwilliamson]

There was a paper published a few years ago showing that increasingly strict car seat requirements in the States have been a significant drag on the number of families that have a third child.

https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?...id=3665046

[nms]

There was a paper published a few years ago showing that increasingly strict car seat requirements in the States have been a significant drag on the number of families that have a third child.

https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?...id=3665046

That's one way to reduce the global population (Given that 2.1 children per couple is the generally accepted replacement birth rate level)

[danbrotherston]

There was a paper published a few years ago showing that increasingly strict car seat requirements in the States have been a significant drag on the number of families that have a third child.

https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?...id=3665046

That's one way to reduce the global population (Given that 2.1 children per couple is the generally accepted replacement birth rate level)

I mean, 2.1 children per couple is the target average for stable population.

But 2.1 children per couple means many families with 3, 4, even 5 children will not be unusual. Just as there are many many childless couples.

So yeah, policies which make it hard to have more than 2 kids will mean significant downward pressure on population.

[Acitta]

Apparently, the City of Kitchener prefers education rather than safe road design.

Kitchener launches Vision Zero street safety education campaign

[danbrotherston]

Ooof..."shared responsibility"...this is a mess.

[tomh009]

Apparently, the City of Kitchener prefers education rather than safe road design.

Kitchener launches Vision Zero street safety education campaign

In fairness, I think they are doing both. Speed limits are being lowered and streets are being narrowed. But there are a lot of streets, and it will take decades to rebuild them all. Need to complement the street changes with an educational campaign.

And I do think that while by "shared responsibility" they mean all road users, the focus is clearly on motor vehicles, as the word "speeding" occurs repeatedly in that bulletin.

[danbrotherston]

I guess we'll see.

I don't know, I know the staff are working hard to make it a success, and they mostly know what's going on.

But they're also timid in the face of making waves. I know a year ago when they were planning this I raised the issue of "some vehicles pose more danger to pedestrians" and they felt that saying such a thing was really impossible.

[danbrotherston]

Is Waterloo City really revisiting their 30km/h proposal?

Honestly!?

No, honestly, I have no interest in reading more drivel from Outhit, so I have no idea if he's reporting news or just stirring up more trouble. Someone else can ruin their day with it.

https://www.therecord.com/news/waterloo-...or-no.html

[ijmorlan]

I’m not clear what’s going on. They voted to implement a speed limit reduction last term, but now they’re voting again? So are they voting on whether or not to cancel the policy? I suppose it hasn’t been implemented yet.

This is weird:

“Coun. Diane Freeman has said she was wrong last June to vote for a reduction to 30 km/h. She would not say Friday if she will now vote against the speed reduction.”

If she says that she was wrong to vote a particular way last year, why wouldn’t she state clearly that she won’t vote that way this year? Essentially she’s refusing to say whether she will vote the way that is, in her opinion, correct. Maybe she thinks her opinion might change again before the vote…

One thing I will say: we should not adopt a policy that would slow down only buses. Unless GRT has a policy of going the speed of traffic, then a very low limit will only slow down buses but not other traffic. This would be counterproductive. Unlike on the LRT line where choosing to limit the LRT to the surrounding speed limit is a fundamentally arbitrary choice, I don’t think we can really set different limits for transit (or maybe we can?). Note: I’m not saying limits shouldn’t be reduced, but on roads with buses whatever policy is adopted should be one that results in buses continuing to go at the speed of traffic.

[cherrypark]

I don't fully understand why - at least in the position of a few councillors around the benefit of the new limit enabling slower limits on new road designs - this couldn't be done with a blanket drop to 40 and instituting that all new construction and road updates would require a road diet and scaling design down to 30.

I guess its more complicated in practice having to sign all the 30s, but it bums me out if they roll it back only to lock out the chance to start making neighbourhood roads safer just because in the short term the roads are designed to feel safe at faster speed.

[danbrotherston]

I’m not clear what’s going on. They voted to implement a speed limit reduction last term, but now they’re voting again? So are they voting on whether or not to cancel the policy? I suppose it hasn’t been implemented yet.

This is weird:

“Coun. Diane Freeman has said she was wrong last June to vote for a reduction to 30 km/h. She would not say Friday if she will now vote against the speed reduction.”

If she says that she was wrong to vote a particular way last year, why wouldn’t she state clearly that she won’t vote that way this year? Essentially she’s refusing to say whether she will vote the way that is, in her opinion, correct. Maybe she thinks her opinion might change again before the vote…

One thing I will say: we should not adopt a policy that would slow down only buses. Unless GRT has a policy of going the speed of traffic, then a very low limit will only slow down buses but not other traffic. This would be counterproductive. Unlike on the LRT line where choosing to limit the LRT to the surrounding speed limit is a fundamentally arbitrary choice, I don’t think we can really set different limits for transit (or maybe we can?). Note: I’m not saying limits shouldn’t be reduced, but on roads with buses whatever policy is adopted should be one that results in buses continuing to go at the speed of traffic.

We do know that speed limits do slow traffic. They doubly slow traffic if traffic is stuck behind a bus going slower.

But it's a moot point anyway, this applied only to residential streets, and most bus routes travel mostly along arterial and connector roads where the limit does not apply.