Speed up Vision Zero

After another terrible week of needless pedestrian and cyclist deaths, Toronto Mayor John Tory wants to increase funding for road safety. It’s much needed. The city’s “Vision Zero” initiative — which aims to eliminate all road fatalities by 2021 — needs more funding to speed up road redesign and other measures to make walking and cycling in Toronto less hazardous.

When Tory asks for another $13 million on Tuesday, the city’s executive committee should swiftly approve it. As should council later this month.

The new funding will bring the city’s multi-year budget for its road safety plan up to $100 million, with $34 million of it to be spent this year. Even then, the city won’t be spending nearly as much per capita as other major cities have when they’ve decided to get serious about creating safer roads.

New York, as Star stories outlined on the weekend, has dramatically reduced pedestrian deaths in the past four years.

And they did it with many of the same measures outlined in Toronto’s road safety plan: redesigned roads and narrowed lanes to slow down traffic; increased use of bicycle lanes; reduced speed limits; and increased pedestrian crossings and markings.

If New York can reduce its road death toll, there’s no reason Toronto can’t do it.

“Over the past few days, we have once again seen how dangerous and deadly our streets can be,” Tory said, summing up the city’s problem. So, we know the problem. And we know the solution. It’s not magic. It just takes the will of council to finally make it a priority.