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Car drivers and pedestrians need to be cautious on the roadways. They need to be focussed on the road ahead. But local municipalities have to do more to ensure that all pedestrians have access to adequate sidewalks and are able to get around in the community without putting themselves at risk on the roadways.

January 28, 2010, Kitchener, Ontario

Posted by: Robert Deutschmann, Personal Injury Lawyer

The Waterloo Region Record Editorial provides some good insight and information to consider about the recent increase in the number of accidents involving cars and pedestrians.  The central message is clearly that we all have to take our time and be more attentive to the road when driving or walking around streets and sidewalks.  One item that was not commented on was the lack of adequate sidewalks or access for people with disablities to get around in the community.  It is an interesting item for discussion when governments make choices about where sidewalks will be placed when they are aware of the regular pedestrian traffic in an area of heavy traffic and dangerous roadways.

 

 

Less rushing, more focus as we navigate the streets
 
 
January 28, 2010
Walking to work or school seems to be more dangerous these days, up there with skydiving or mountain climbing.
The facts are deeply disturbing: 14 people have died after collisions with cars on Toronto-area streets this month. That’s equivalent to about 25 per cent of pedestrian deaths in the Greater Toronto Area in all of 2009. Even in Waterloo Region there has been a recent rash of pedestrians injured, with six serious collisions, including one death, since the start of the year.
No one seems to know whether the string of deadly and dangerous incidents is simply coincidental, but the longer view suggests pedestrians are more vulnerable in Waterloo Region than they used to be: from 2004 to 2006, the number of pedestrian collisions on major roads in the region held steady at about 107 collisions. But in the two years following, the number of such collisions has jumped some 12 per cent, to roughly 120 collisions.
Police warn that both drivers and pedestrians need to be vigilant. To some extent, the onus is on drivers, who are in control of two tons or more of motorized steel and have a responsibility to ensure they move through city streets without harming anyone. Ultimately, though, pedestrians are the most vulnerable: The vehicle will always win, and so pedestrians must be on guard for their own welfare.
Distraction seems to be at least partly to blame. Both drivers and victims in some of the recent cases were seen talking on cellphones immediately before a collision. The act of simply talking on a phone is clearly distracting: Doctors have treated people who were injured by falling off curbs, walking into signs or tumbling down manholes — all while those people were talking on cellphones.
New legislation in Ontario reflects that fact, and drivers at least who are not vigilant risk paying a price, starting next Monday, when the grace period runs out on the new law banning drivers from using hand-held devices. Then police will start issuing tickets, rather than warnings, to violators.
Speed may also be to blame. Are we in more of a rush than we used to be? Certainly roads are more crowded than even a few years ago, and southern Ontario is undoubtedly the most congested region in Canada. More drivers using the roads inevitably make the roads more dangerous places. People in a rush take chances: running that amber light, dashing across the street midblock rather than walking to the nearest crosswalk, zipping around a corner or across a street without fully checking that the way is clear.
But perhaps the biggest culprit is complacency. The most common time for collisions is Friday afternoons, when people are tired and rushing to get home — when the minds of drivers and pedestrians are on other things than road safety. Most of us haven’t had a refresher on traffic safety since we passed our driver exams. While the frightening carnage of recent days may jolt some into greater vigilance, it might be worthwhile for police to examine if stepped-up enforcement and education campaigns would be effective. Montreal, where jaywalkers are notorious, stepped up targeted campaigns after a worrying increase in pedestrian collisions in 2006, and saw rates drop dramatically afterwards.
We need to remind ourselves — or be reminded — that roads, and intersections in particular, require alertness, that both drivers and walkers need to prepare for the unexpected and give themselves time to react. The price of not doing so is far too high, as the victims and the families of those who have been killed would surely attest.

About Paquette Travers & Deutschmann

Paquette Travers & Deutschmann serve South-Western Ontario with offices in Kitchener-Waterloo, Cambridge, Woodstock, Brantford, Stratford and Ayr. The law practice of Robert Deutschmann and Doug O’Toole focuses almost exclusively in personal injury and disability insurance matters. For more information, please visit www.deutschmannlaw.com or call us toll-free at 1-866-414-4878.

The opinions expressed here, while intended to provide useful information, should not be interpreted as legal recommendations or advice.