A wave of dangerous driving in the GTA is prompting calls for strict enforcement, design change

Thestar.com
June 2, 2021

On Monday night, motorcyclists travelling at high speed crashed on the DVP, killing a 39-year-old woman and sending two men to hospital.

Saturday afternoon, police in Richmond Hill say they stopped a 23-year-old man driving his Mercedes SUV at 202 km/h in a 60 km/h zone.

Two weeks ago, a 16-year-old driver struck and killed a four-year-old boy and his 10-year-old sister as they were fixing their bikes in their family driveway in Vaughan.

Based on these reports and others, it may appear like madness has descended on GTA roads amid the pandemic. Reports of street racing are up significantly. Police have busted high-profile stunt-driving gatherings -- like the one earlier this year that saw a Toronto police car damaged and a North York street set on fire. And road deaths are happening frequently, even with fewer cars on the road.

As Ontario approaches a full reopening sometime later this summer, politicians, police and safety advocates are calling for a slew of measures to boost road safety and change driver behaviour.

Toronto police, Peel Regional Police and the OPP have all reported large jumps in stunt-driving charges amid the pandemic -- up more than 25 per cent in 2020 for the OPP, and more than double previous years in both Toronto and Peel.

These numbers point to a trend toward more frequent dangerous driving, said Peel Deputy Chief Marc Andrews. “I think the higher speeds equate to more catastrophic results, which means more fatalities,” he said. Indeed, Peel police reported 43 total road deaths in 2020, nearly double 2019 and more even than in Toronto, where police reported 40 fatalities.

Even with less traffic and fewer minor collisions, OPP spokesperson Terri McCormack said, it’s been “disappointing and concerning to see so many drivers behaving aggressively and dangerously ... There were about 20,000 fewer collisions in 2020, but the rate of fatalities didn’t come down proportionately.”

In Toronto -- where police issued 88,142 speeding tickets in 2020, up 151 per cent from 2019 -- police spokesperson Jason Kraft added: “At the end of the day collisions are inevitable, but it’s particularly the ones involving vulnerable road users,” like pedestrians and cyclists, that cause concern.

Advocates and experts say enforcement can go a long way to change driver behaviour. Fine a driver parked in a bicycle lane $500 instead of $150 or give a hit-and-run driver “automatic jail time,” and others will be less likely to offend, said Gil Penalosa, founder and chair of 8 80 Cities.

The key to changing drivers’ reckless behaviour is to make them think they’ll get caught, added University of Toronto criminologist Anthony Doob.

He suggested police can achieve that by moving around and being more visible, both in open areas with higher traffic volume, where lanes are wider and drivers are more likely to exceed posted speed limits, and in residential areas with less traffic and narrow roads, but where drivers can also dangerously speed up.

“What you want is for people who drive on these small residential streets to believe that there is a measurable likelihood of being caught,” he said, noting even if the police don’t hand out lots of tickets in these smaller streets, their heavy presence can help deter bad behaviour from drivers.

“I would look to compliance with the traffic laws as the goal, not number of tickets.”

That’s why Peel road safety advocate Jillian McLeod was particularly pleased to see the Ontario government introduce the Moving Ontarians More Safely Act in April. The law proposing harsher penalties for street racing and stunt driving, including lengthy mandatory licence suspensions even for convictions on a first offence.

“I think that will deter repeat behaviour more,” said McLeod, who’s behind a national petition that has amassed 108, 000 signatures calling for harsher penalties.

Toronto police say they were called to the Don Valley Parkway around 10:40 p.m. Monday over reports of a collision after a group of motorcycles had been travelling at a high rate of speed in the southbound lanes north of Don Mills Road.

Police say the rider of a 2016 Suzuki motorcycle first struck a metal barrier before a 2009 Honda motorcycle also became involved in the crash. A 39-year-old woman was pronounced dead at the scene. Police say she is the city’s ninth road death of the year so far.

A 35-year-old man who sustained life-threatening injuries and a 40-year-old man who suffered serious injuries remain in hospital.

Police ask anyone who may have security or dashboard camera footage of the crash to contact investigators.

The uptick in stunt driving and street racing has prompted GTA police services to allocate more resources to traffic.

Moving forward, Kraft said Toronto police will continue to use a multi-pronged approach -- from drivers’ education on traffic rules to focused enforcement efforts, including the use of dedicated Vision Zero officers for pedestrian and cyclist’s safety -- to guide police operations heading into reopening.

In Peel, municipal leaders and police last month kicked off an awareness campaign to encourage drivers to slow down and comply with posted speed limits, with Mississauga mayor Bonnie Crombie, reiterating that speeding is “a serious issue on our roads.”

The region is also expanding its use of red-light cameras, electronic radar speed signs, radar speed trailers and traffic calming signs.

Andrews added that Peel police are focusing on high-risk behaviour and repeat offenders by making sure every driver charged with impaired driving is referred to the Peel Addiction and Assessment Referral Center.

Still, for some advocates, change needs to be more sweeping than that. Toronto safety advocate Janet Joy Wilson points to strategies in cities like Paris -- where the mayor has announced plans to ban most cars on downtown streets, giving cyclists and pedestrians more space -- and Montreal, which is increasing the number of pedestrian-only streets in the downtown area.

“After seven years of unsuccessful Vision Zero implementation, our streets have become as the wild west and a car-centric focus is killing us,” she said.

For Jessica Spieker, who is part of Friends and Families for Safe Streets, a group made up of people who’ve been affected by road violence, safety on GTA roads remains a problem because of the lack of political will to shift the central focus of our road design from cars to people, she said.

An overhaul of street designs, especially in residential neighbourhoods -- like the location of the Vaughan crash that killed the two young siblings -- would be one way to help fix the problem. Things like elevated crosswalks, more speed bumps and intersection redesigns are cheap ways to make it “uncomfortable for drivers to speed” and protect cyclists and pedestrians, she said.

Spiker, who sustained a broken spine and brain injury when she was T-boned by a driver while cycling in 2015, added that although she also wants to see more photo radar and speed cameras installed across Toronto, the solution can’t be just about enforcement.

“We’ve had 100 years of failing to enforce and educate our way out of road violence,” she said. “There’s no such thing as a completely successful education or enforcement campaign.”