Normally, defensive walking works
There was nothing that the walking victims of the YongeFinch van attack could have done to save themselves. Often not spry, all they had were their own two feet and, if they were lucky, shouted warnings. The killer drove so far down Yonge St. that he was perhaps able to select his helpless victims. Maybe he hated women. This could explain why so many women died or were injured.
Urbanists, probably of the cycling tribe, jumped in to say that many hundreds of people have been killed by cars in this city and no one hears about them. But they weren’t killed intentionally.
I have been considering the safety of the individual walking in this city — I walk and take transit a lot — and am wondering how, on a normal noncatastrophic day, pedestrians can move the odds slightly in their favour. Some call it defensive walking; I call it walking the line, or the walk of life. Pick your own song title.
Here’s my bylaw: follow traffic rules to the letter. Even while wearing headphones or texting, be alert enough not to cross the street on a yellow or a red. Do not dash. Even when the streets are empty and you feel foolish about daft public obedience, wait for the light. This will become second nature.
Never jaywalk. Annoying as this is on a rainy day, walk to the nearest lights. You will be significantly less likely to get hit. Recall that when you drive, you don’t really register pedestrians airily cutting across. And if you’re driving west in the late afternoon, you’re almost driving blind. Pedestrians forget this.
This helps in foreign cities too. In London, if you can’t cope with Look Left or Look Right printed on the pavement for tourists and drunks, you can stay on the sidewalk and make your move after a foren- sic study of foreign corners. In Amsterdam, you’ll die by bicycle. In New York, all rules are broken.
In Paris and Rome, you won’t be walking at all. You will already be dead.
Look at the tanks roaring past you. Ford Motor Co. just announced it will stop making most of its cars and instead build SUVs and trucks. Vehicles are getting bigger, higher and scarier, with intimidating darkened windows.
Even drivers feel they have to buy defensively. What stops an SUV with a bad attitude? A bigger SUV with a bad attitude.
Pedestrians had a chance of survival when they were flung over the hoods of the small cars that struck them. But an SUV will take you down hard.
Now you are lying on the street bleeding. What next? Your best defence will fall to the highly organized public safety organizations patrolling Toronto’s streets. I learned about them this week after a relatively minor incident.
It was a bland, nothing day, just like Monday was at Yonge and Finch. I had rushed downtown to buy a refrigerator at the Bay. My wretched kitchen reno was going badly, Ikea’s delivery service so inept that I told them to give up lest they suffer a spinal injury. (Good Canadian #1)
The young man on the streetcar was loud, shouting about stabbing or getting stabbed. He began screaming at the driver. Fellow passengers told him to shut up, one of them attacked him and an energetic fight broke out. What had he said about knives?
I took photos and learned this: men facing off are too enraged to notice being filmed. The driver called in for help, everyone left, and I stayed with the photos with a vague feeling that Const. Ken Lam did the right thing by Toronto so I should too. (Good Canadian #2)
The help services are instantly connected. The driver radioed the cops and the TTC. The cops called. A TTC officer came to investigate. The driver was asked twice if we needed ambulances and if we were okay.
I wasn’t really. My greatest fear is dying embarrassingly. Being stabbed on the Queen streetcar would be one thing, but I was carrying a large chicken pot pie. I don’t want to be remembered that way. She had pie/when she died. At least there was sweetcorn. At least she didn’t die alone.
The TTC called to offer the driver stress counselling.
This amazed me. What a fine organization. I was reassured.
I got to know the driver and the TTC safety officer (hey there, Ed) well. We talked about crime, our kids, Forcillo, Lam, the Yonge deaths, cop college. I emailed in my pics and said I’d take a cab home.
Nonsense, said Ed. I’ll drive you home, and he did. (Good Canadian #3)
What kindness, what a safety net on the streets of Toronto. There is no way to stop mad, violent hate, but you can count on this hidden system when you need it.