Pedestrians should ‘see and be seen’
‘There is no collision without two sides to it,’ police warn road users
On a gloomy Tuesday morning in early November, police closed a major roadway in Oshawa to cordon off a scene that’s become all too familiar: A car sitting still, as if stopped in its tracks, orange traffic cones and a cruiser, rooftop lights blazing, blocking an intersection. A few pieces of personal property lying on the rain-slicked street.
It was Nov. 6. At 6:45 a.m. that day a 65-year-old man stepped onto Wilson Road, south of Olive Avenue, intending to cross the street. He was struck by a southbound car and sustained serious injuries that required emergency transfer to a Toronto trauma centre.
Two weeks later the senior, who was not identified by police, died, yet another instance of a vulnerable road user being killed by a vehicle on Durham Region’s roads.
A recent spate of collisions involving vulnerable road users such as pedestrians and cyclists reinforces the necessity of all road users to be aware of one another and to practice the diligence needed to avoid tragedy, said Sgt. Matt Flower of the Durham police Traffic Services Bureau. The onus is on both motorists and vulnerable road users, he said.
“There is no collision without two sides to it,” said Flower.
Collisions involving cars and vulnerable road users invariably involve a failure of one of the parties to take proper care, Flower said.
It is incumbent on drivers to pay proper attention and watch out for others on the road, but pedestrians and cyclists also have a duty to obey rules of the road and, as winter approaches and daylight dwindles, to make sure they are visible to drivers.
Collisions can occur when motorists are distracted, or driving too quickly; they also happen when vulnerable road users commit errors such as failing to use designated crosswalks or taking steps to ensure they are visible to drivers.
“You can’t say it’s always a car problem,” Flower said.
The Traffic Services Bureau annually investigates an average of 40 serious collisions a year — there are an average of 25 collisions a day in Durham, but not all reach the threshold for an investigation by the unit — many of them involving pedestrians or cyclists. Statistics provided by Flower indicate that in 2017 there were169 collisions involving pedestrians and 44 involving cyclists; so far in 2018, there have been 170 incidents involving pedestrians and 48 involving cyclists.
Over the past month there have been a number of serious incidents:
A19-year-old Whitby woman sustained life-threatening injuries when she was struck by a vehicle while attempting to cross the street at the intersection of Taunton Road West and Cochrane Street at about 11:30 p.m. on Oct. 31. Police said the pedestrian was crossing Taunton southbound on the west side of the intersection when she was struck by a westbound vehicle.
In the incident mentioned above, a 65-year-old man was seriously injured when he was hit by a car while crossing Wilson Road south of Olive Avenue in Oshawa at around 6:45 a.m. Nov. 6. The man, who wasn’t identified, died in hospital two weeks later.
A 45-year-old Whitby man was rushed to hospital and later airlifted to a Toronto trauma centre after being struck by a vehicle in the area of Garden and Dundas streets at around 6:30 p.m. Nov. 13. Durham police said the man was crossing the street when he was struck by a Mazda 3 travelling north on Garden.
A19-year-old student died after he was struck by a vehicle near the Durham College — UOIT campus at the intersection of Simcoe Street and Conlin Road around 3:30 p.m. Nov. 14.
The student, identified by school officials as Rhyss Glenfield of Mitchell, Ont., was at a traffic island awaiting a green light to cross the street when he was struck by a southbound vehicle driven by an 18-year-old man, police said.
Human behaviour is at the root of mishaps on the road, and they take place in spite of the efforts of municipalities to enhance road safety, said Brian Patterson, president and CEO of the Ontario Safety League. He blames bad habits and a lack of insight about the consequences of risky road behaviour.
“Bad habits build up over time,” Patterson said. “Reasonable (road) design can be so easily overridden by entitlement and discourtesy.”
Part of the problem, Patterson contends, is that road users tend to focus on the potential legal liability for bad behaviour — how much will the traffic ticket for an infraction be? — rather than the carnage they can inflict.
He suggests road users who are ticketed for driving offences ought to be required to take retraining to learn about the potential consequences of their behaviour.
“We’re really focused on the offence and the judicial system,” he said. “I’d like them to know that this (offence) is a high-risk activity, and they shouldn’t be doing it.”
“People who are doing 20 kilometres over the speed limit because they don’t think the police are going to catch them aren’t seeing the connection,” Patterson said. “It is very much an increasing risk to vulnerable road users.”
Flower’s advice to road users is to remain hyper-vigilant and anticipate potential collisions — just because the roadway in front of you is clear at the moment, that doesn’t mean a change can’t occur within seconds.
The same goes for pedestrians and cyclists, for whom the rule is to see and be seen, said Flower. And it’s up to everyone, whether driving, walking or cycling, to avoid distraction, from cellphones or other causes.
“The best way we can prevent these collisions from happening is to be aware,” he said.