Road design, safety and Vision Zero

[tomh009]

The street itself does look nice, the buildings less so. By the look of the buildings, I assume this is somewhere in Waterloo?

[KevinL]

The street itself does look nice, the buildings less so. By the look of the buildings, I assume this is somewhere in Waterloo?

It's a redo of Waterloo's Larch Street, yes. They're referring to it as a woonerf but I'm not sure it strictly fits the definition.

[danbrotherston]

News on this front.

The sad news, an elderly woman crashed a vehicle into a group of girl scouts killing on child and injuring many more. A horrific collision that should never have happened. It is the nexus of everything wrong with our transportation policy. Someone who maybe shouldn't have been driving, who probably needed to killing vulnerable road users, children in this case on a busy dangerous road. It's just devastating, so many children killed in the past few years.

On the brighter side, Kitchener staff are bringing an admittedly, I believe flawed, but still honest and meaningful Vision Zero policy to council next week. It's exciting to see progress being made on these issues, even if it too little too late for entirely too many people.

[Acitta]

News on this front.

The sad news, an elderly woman crashed a vehicle into a group of girl scouts killing on child and injuring many more. A horrific collision that should never have happened. It is the nexus of everything wrong with our transportation policy. Someone who maybe shouldn't have been driving, who probably needed to killing vulnerable road users, children in this case on a busy dangerous road. It's just devastating, so many children killed in the past few years.

On the brighter side, Kitchener staff are bringing an admittedly, I believe flawed, but still honest and meaningful Vision Zero policy to council next week. It's exciting to see progress being made on these issues, even if it too little too late for entirely too many people.

This occurred in London. Wonderland (st)Road is an atrocity. My brother lives in a highrise there.

[danbrotherston]

News on this front.

The sad news, an elderly woman crashed a vehicle into a group of girl scouts killing on child and injuring many more. A horrific collision that should never have happened. It is the nexus of everything wrong with our transportation policy. Someone who maybe shouldn't have been driving, who probably needed to killing vulnerable road users, children in this case on a busy dangerous road. It's just devastating, so many children killed in the past few years.

On the brighter side, Kitchener staff are bringing an admittedly, I believe flawed, but still honest and meaningful Vision Zero policy to council next week. It's exciting to see progress being made on these issues, even if it too little too late for entirely too many people.

This occurred in London. Wonderland (st)Road is an atrocity. My brother lives in a highrise there.

Yes, I should have mentioned it was in London, but it is an event of national importance.

I grew up in London, a few blocks from Wonderland Rd. My parents live just off Riverside Dr., only a couple of KMs away. It was basically my first experience with roads.

[dtkmelissa]

For those interested, I have put together a short summary of the staff report on Vision Zero, over on Twitter.

[nms]

News on this front.

The sad news, an elderly woman crashed a vehicle into a group of girl scouts killing on child and injuring many more. A horrific collision that should never have happened. It is the nexus of everything wrong with our transportation policy. Someone who maybe shouldn't have been driving, who probably needed to killing vulnerable road users, children in this case on a busy dangerous road. It's just devastating, so many children killed in the past few years.

On the brighter side, Kitchener staff are bringing an admittedly, I believe flawed, but still honest and meaningful Vision Zero policy to council next week. It's exciting to see progress being made on these issues, even if it too little too late for entirely too many people.

Why not wait for the police report before condemning the driver? It is an awful accident, but we don't need to cast aspersions from our keyboards.

[danbrotherston]

News on this front.

The sad news, an elderly woman crashed a vehicle into a group of girl scouts killing on child and injuring many more. A horrific collision that should never have happened. It is the nexus of everything wrong with our transportation policy. Someone who maybe shouldn't have been driving, who probably needed to killing vulnerable road users, children in this case on a busy dangerous road. It's just devastating, so many children killed in the past few years.

On the brighter side, Kitchener staff are bringing an admittedly, I believe flawed, but still honest and meaningful Vision Zero policy to council next week. It's exciting to see progress being made on these issues, even if it too little too late for entirely too many people.

Why not wait for the police report before condemning the driver? It is an awful accident, but we don't need to cast aspersions from our keyboards.

The driver ran over a group of girl scouts.

It's pretty clear something has gone terribly wrong and given the reliability of modern vehicles I'm willing to say with confidence it wasn't a mechanical failure. Whether it was aggressive driving, a momentary (like many seconds, the crash covered over 100 meters) lapse in concentration or judgement, or an age related infirmity is not relevant to me, they all come to the same conclusion.

And frankly, I'd scoff at your complaint less if I wasn't already being generous with the word "maybe".

As for "waiting for the police report"...nah...I don't really trust police reports WRT driver behaviour. Given the profile of this collision, the police report is likely to be extensive and reliable. But in general, it's not something I put a lot of trust in.

[Rainrider22]

Are you saying you can be certain of what happened, or lay blame, without a set of facts of circumstance provided through evidence ?

[ijmorlan]

News on this front.

The sad news, an elderly woman crashed a vehicle into a group of girl scouts killing on child and injuring many more. A horrific collision that should never have happened. It is the nexus of everything wrong with our transportation policy. Someone who maybe shouldn't have been driving, who probably needed to killing vulnerable road users, children in this case on a busy dangerous road. It's just devastating, so many children killed in the past few years.

On the brighter side, Kitchener staff are bringing an admittedly, I believe flawed, but still honest and meaningful Vision Zero policy to council next week. It's exciting to see progress being made on these issues, even if it too little too late for entirely too many people.

Why not wait for the police report before condemning the driver? It is an awful accident, but we don't need to cast aspersions from our keyboards.

I don’t read that as a condemnation — “Someone who maybe shouldn't have been driving, who probably needed to” — given the driver is old, there is an increased probability that they no longer have the cognitive ability to drive safely; and given the way our cities are built, there is a good chance they were driving because they had no other reasonable way to get where they were going. It appears the solution to cases like this is not severe enforcement as it is with drunk driving and other types of deliberate bad driving, but rather re-designing our cities to make transit and active transportation more feasible for more people.

So it’s a reasonable speculation. We’ll see whether it turns out to be accurate in this case.

[danbrotherston]

Are you saying you can be certain of what happened, or lay blame, without a set of facts of circumstance provided through evidence ?

I'm so tired of this bullshit.

There are multiple witness accounts, physical evidence, even police statements at this point.

The idea that I'm not allowed to have an opinion about what happened is utterly bizarre.

The police and the justice system are the arbiters of legal consequences, not of reality, and often not even of justice.

If you folks want to make every excuse for the driver whose actions led to the death of a child and the hospitalization of almost a dozen others, be my fucking guest. I on the other hand, as a parent, and a person, cannot deal with that. Doubly so, when I routinely have to walk in traffic on Victoria St. because sociopaths who think themselves good people, park on the sidewalk and force me or my partner into traffic with my child.

[Bytor]

This thread about the pedestrians hit on the sidewalk in Toronto:

https://twitter.com/moore_oliver/status/...GdJxw&s=19

"Parlour training for pedestrians".

[jeffster]

This thread about the pedestrians hit on the sidewalk in Toronto:

https://twitter.com/moore_oliver/status/...GdJxw&s=19

"Parlour training for pedestrians".

Interesting thread as the police are laying some responsibility to the pedestrians on a sidewalk. While I 'get it' that everyone needs to pay attention, one should be able to walk on a sidewalk with some confidence that they're not going to be ran over. Especially true if you have a speeding vehicle, especially if they speed while make a turn, you simply don't have time to react if you're a pedestrian even if you were paying 100% attention.

As for pedestrian safety, there are two main issues (one issue I will bring up won't be popular).

1) Police need to start enforcing traffic laws. This sort of thing pays for itself, especially if we increase fines. 10 years ago, you would rarely see people run a red light (to turn right on a red) yet this happens all the time now. Same applies to bikers and pedestrians who disobey controlled intersections. Start fining people for real. Distracting driving? $2,000 minimum, or perhaps make it linked to your income somehow (like they do in some euro nations). Same with running red lights (in particular, right on red) and stop signs. There really isn't much excuse for running over someone at an intersection, if you're obeying traffic laws and yielding when you should.

2) (Unpopular in bold) Car needs to have lights on during dark hours, bikes need to have lights and reflectors, and pedestrians need to be visible in the dark.

If law enforcement was to concentrate on some traffic enforcement rather than donut breaks and arresting and beating up visible minorities, the roads would become a lot safer. Perhaps too there should be more focus on mental health of officers - they shouldn't be working if they're mentally handicapped for whatever reason. Their mental and physical health needs to be a focus with the PD.

That said, we do have technology that could mitigate accidents. And we have a choice to use that, and make it a requirement for all cars.

[timc]

It's interesting that "the vehicle lost control", and that the operator of the vehicle apparently had nothing to do with the incident.

[neonjoe]

It's interesting that "the vehicle lost control", and that the operator of the vehicle apparently had nothing to do with the incident.

Typically the case for this would be a poorly maintained vehicle, for example:  inappropriate tires, worn linkages, etc. Although there have been cases where the manufacturer is at fault and these cases tend to lead to recalls.
I would say the operator/owner is always responsible and should know what to do when something fails in the vehicle.