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Road Safety & Vision Zero Plan

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Toronto city hall still throwing up roadblocks to road safety
 
In Toronto the default maximum speed s 50 m/hr. In the TEYCC area all "Local" roads are now set at 30 but it would be FAR more effective if the City made the DEFAULT maximum for whole City 30km. Of course, some roads could then, after study, be set at higher minimums but to have narrow residential streets like The Esplanade with maximums of 40 is wrong and changing them one by one is time consuming and requires more and more signage.
 
The suburban councillors do not want to lower the speed limits across the city. They use the "money" excuse, except that if we have a lower default speed limit, it would mean A LOT LESS of the lower speed limit signs needed.
 
Some reasons why putting up a sign with a reduced speed limit will do exactly nothing:
Police enforcement is sporadic and minimal;
Police don’t even enforce to posted limits when they’re around;
We refuse to deploy speed cameras;
We’ve built many of our streets to encourage fast driving. For example, suburban arterial roads are often basically highways;
A majority of Toronto drivers travel well above the limit whenever possible as a matter of right; and
We refuse to implement proven physical traffic-calming measures like lane-narrowing, wider sidewalks, raised pedestrian crossings at intersections and roundabouts. Though we are ok with speed bumps and stop signs, which is something.

Vision Zero is more or less equivalent to putting up those signs that say, “Slow down, kid’s (sic) at play.”
 
Some reasons why putting up a sign with a reduced speed limit will do exactly nothing:
Police enforcement is sporadic and minimal;
Police don’t even enforce to posted limits when they’re around;
We refuse to deploy speed cameras;
We’ve built many of our streets to encourage fast driving. For example, suburban arterial roads are often basically highways;
A majority of Toronto drivers travel well above the limit whenever possible as a matter of right; and
We refuse to implement proven physical traffic-calming measures like lane-narrowing, wider sidewalks, raised pedestrian crossings at intersections and roundabouts. Though we are ok with speed bumps and stop signs, which is something.

Vision Zero is more or less equivalent to putting up those signs that say, “Slow down, kid’s (sic) at play.”

Thank you for the response. That was much better than W K Lis's silly "suburban councillors" rant which he keeps repeating!
 
Built form is different between the more urban areas and the suburban areas of Toronto. It feels right to drive at 30km/h in Cabbagetown, but feels like a crawl doing the same on a side street in Agincourt.
The block sizes are also smaller in downtown and older neighbourhoods - less distance to get from a local road to an arterial.
 
Built form is different between the more urban areas and the suburban areas of Toronto. It feels right to drive at 30km/h in Cabbagetown, but feels like a crawl doing the same on a side street in Agincourt.
The block sizes are also smaller in downtown and older neighbourhoods - less distance to get from a local road to an arterial.

Sometimes I drive at or slightly below the speed limit on residential backstreets in the suburbs/outer suburbs. People get soo pissed. "Asshole doesn't know how to drive, let me overtake him on this blind curve next to a playground".
 
Sometimes I drive at or slightly below the speed limit on residential backstreets in the suburbs/outer suburbs. People get soo pissed. "Asshole doesn't know how to drive, let me overtake him on this blind curve next to a playground".

They can "overtake" because of the wider streets in the suburbs, which encourage speeders. If the streets were narrower, there would be less passing or overtaking, and speeding.
 
Cars All but Banned on One of Manhattan’s Busiest Streets
Starting on Thursday, cars are no longer welcome on 14th Street, a major crosstown route for 21,000 vehicles a day.

From link.

New York City has been steadily taking space away from cars since the first pedestrian plazas were carved out of the asphalt streetscape more than a decade ago.

Roads that were once the exclusive domain of cars have been squeezed to make way for bike and bus-only lanes. Prime parking spots have been turned into urban green spaces. Traffic lights give pedestrians a head start crossing intersections.

Now, city officials are taking their most ambitious stand yet against cars: Beginning Thursday, passenger cars, including taxis and Ubers, will be all but banned from one of Manhattan’s busiest streets, 14th Street, a major crosstown route for 21,000 vehicles a day that links the East and West Sides.

The traffic experiment got off to an orderly but soggy start at 6 a.m. with traffic officers in neon yellow slickers stationed at intersections along 14th Street. They waved buses through while turning cars away. Patrol cars with blinking lights crawled up and down the street.

Drivers seemed to follow the new rules, at least for now. One car braked abruptly while trying to turn off Third Avenue onto 14th Street. Traffic officers stepped back to let the car through, but signaled that it had to make the next right off the street.

Some bus riders were already enjoying quicker commutes with cars largely cleared out of the way, which is a main goal of the new restrictions.

“It’s pretty fast now. Buses are moving a lot faster,” said Steven Colon, 25, a customer assistant at a grocery store, who commutes to work by bus along 14th Street. “This is a good idea because a lot of people double park and it causes a lot of congestion.”

From now on, drivers are allowed onto 14th Street only to make deliveries and pick up and drop off passengers from 6 a.m. to 10 p.m., seven days a week. They can travel just a block or two before they have to turn right off the street. No left turns are allowed. The police will give out warnings at first and surveillance cameras will be watching.

“It’s not that cars are losing ground, it’s that New Yorkers are gaining ground, literally,” said Danny Pearlstein, a spokesman for the Riders Alliance, an advocacy group for transit riders. “We make the city what it is. Cars get in the way."

The city’s campaign to make its streets less welcoming to cars has drawn an increasingly intense backlash from drivers, businesses and residents who have gone to court to stop some of the efforts, including the new rules along 14th Street.

“It’s a big inconvenience,” said Richard Small, a New Jersey commuter who will now have to drive five blocks out of his way to get to work on 14th Street. “I think it’s extreme and there should be a compromise. Everybody pays taxes — not just the people in the buses.”

New York’s traffic experiment comes as cities across the world are taking a harder line against cars. Cars are no longer being allowed to roam freely as traffic chokes the streets, contributes to climate change and threatens the safety of pedestrians and bicyclists.

Paris has banned cars from the city center one Sunday a month. Barcelona has reorganized some streets into superblocks where intersections now serve as playgrounds and cars are pushed to the edges. London charges drivers a hefty congestion fee for entering the busiest neighborhoods — a move that New York will follow when it becomes the first American city to introduce congestion pricing in Manhattan in 2021.

Toronto was the model for New York’s 14th Street experiment. In 2017, it restricted cars from driving across a 1.6-mile stretch of King Street to clear the way for streetcars. Since then, streetcar speeds have increased and service has become more reliable, though some restaurants and stores have lost business.

New York, which has 6,000 miles of streets, once catered to cars by building a network of roadways that still cuts through the city. But that car-centric view later shifted as the city struggled with worsening gridlock that has crippled its public bus system, whose ridership is in decline.

Today, pedestrians and cyclists elbow for more space alongside cars. Ride-hailing apps have ushered in Ubers and Lyfts, and Amazon has helped fuel a 24/7 armada of delivery trucks.

The 14th Street busway is the centerpiece of the city’s efforts to turn a one-mile stretch of the street, between Third and Ninth Avenues, into a transit corridor that will improve bus reliability and perhaps attract more riders.

Bus speeds along 14th Street are among the slowest in the nation, crawling at an average of 4.5 miles per hour. Daily bus ridership along the street has fallen to 28,000 from 38,000 in the past decade.

“New York City is failing bus riders on a daily basis and we are hemorrhaging riders as a result,” said Corey Johnson, the City Council speaker whose district includes 14th Street. “People are getting off buses and into cars, which is unacceptable as we try to fight climate change by encouraging green modes of transportation.”

Juliana Santos, 42, a medical assistant, said she would have more time — and less stress — if the buses moved faster and did not get stuck behind cars. A seven- to eight-minute crosstown bus ride can easily stretch to twice that, or longer. “If you don’t get those delays, you’d be on time anywhere you go,” she said.
The 14th Street busway had been twice delayed by lawsuits brought by local residents and block associations, but was allowed to go forward last week after a panel of judges lifted a previous order blocking it.

The busway grew out of the contingency planning for the shutdown of the L train, which travels between Manhattan and Brooklyn. Although transit officials called off the shutdown in January, the plans for the busway remained.

Now, the restrictions are part of an 18-month pilot program that could be made permanent. Curbside parking spots have been eliminated and replaced by loading zones. After the initial warnings, drivers who ignore the restrictions will receive tickets carrying fines starting at $50.

Polly Trottenberg, the city’s transportation commissioner, said the “new busway will be a big boost” for bus riders, “creating more reliable commutes with shorter travel times.”

Along 14th Street, lanes have been painted red and designated for buses and trucks only. Trucks and emergency vehicles will still be allowed across.

At a parking garage on 14th Street, Thomas McDarby, 74, a hair dresser, was not happy as he got into his sedan to drive to work in New Jersey. He pays $550 a month to park there, and was already worried about how to get back home.

“I’m so confused now with these regulations,” he said. “I don’t really know what the regulations are now. It just happened very quickly. It’s just a hassle. There was no way to plan ahead. Plan ahead and do what, sell the car?”

Some local businesses and workers have opposed the traffic experiment, saying that they could lose customers who drive. “It’s not good for business,” said Francisco Lopez, an attendant at a garage on 14th Street. “Everybody’s complaining about it.”

Ray Raddy, the manager of Crossroads Wine & Spirits, said he worried that some customers would find it easier to buy their wine at a store where they can drive right up and park outside. “If I’m a customer and I’m not comfortable coming here,” he said, “I’ll go somewhere else.”

But others were elated the busway had finally arrived.

Ben Rubenstein, 37, an assistant high school principal, said his morning commute usually stretched out because he had to allow extra time in case his bus hit traffic. “I usually wake up earlier so that I can avoid traffic on the cross town bus,” he said.

Not anymore. On Thursday, Mr. Rubenstein reached his school early.

“Ten minutes faster than I expected,” he said.
 
I wonder if that was an influence of Andy Byford

...and a Transportation Department in New York City that actually considers pedestrians, cyclists, and public transit in actually building on Vision Zero. Unlike Toronto's version, which puts up roadblocks or drags it out with Vision Zero.
 
In the latest Vision Zero update to Infrastructure and Environment Ctte, I spied something I've been supportive for ages, moving ahead:

TTC staff will be carrying out a detailed, system-wide stop rationalization review over the next year and will report back to the TTC Board.

Fulll Report here:

Agenda Item History - 2019.IE8.8

Additional items include 3 previously recommended speed limit reductions in Scarborough; a 'no' to motorcycle filter lanes as inconsistent with the HTA
 

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