In August, we reported the whiff of legislation in the air, specifically, the banning of cellphones while driving. This past Tuesday, The Metro reported Ontario was introducing legislation that day to reduce distracted drivers. It’s now only a matter of time before it’s illegal to use hand-held electronic devices while driving.

If this law is passed, any driver caught emailing, texting, surfing the web or chatting on cellphones, BlackBerrys and Global Positioning Systems (GPSs) will face penalties. The ban specifically covers the use of these portable electronic devices and the repercussions include fines and demerit points.

So should you throw away your new GPS? No. The bill developed by Transportation Minister, Jim Bradley, deems Bluetooth technology safe to use while driving, as well as dashboard mounted GPS devices. These exemptions, however, call into question the reasoning behind such as ban as the Ontario Medical Association (OMA) believes they are “just as distracting to drivers because they reduce response times by impairing cognitive function and visual concentration.”

The OMA has been pushing a cellphone ban for three years now. Based on one of their studies, talking on a phone while driving is comparably hazardous (on a relative risk basis) to driving with a blood alcohol level at the legal limit. From the Metro:

“The evidence is clear that driving while using a mobile phone is dangerous to the driver, their passengers and others on or near the roadway,” said OMA president Dr. Ken Arnold.”

The cellphone exemptions to this ban provide both a case for and against this legislation. Additional fuel for the debate is Premier Dalton McGuity’s previous opposition, which he reneged later, to such a ban as he stated that it’s difficult to know where to draw the line between other distractions.

A very good point, despite the vehicular deaths attributed to cellphone use – the reason behind Premier McGuinty’s change of mind. These other distractions include activities such as eating, drinking (non-alcoholic beverages) and smoking cigarettes, all of which entail the use of one’s hands.

So readers, how does the law justify the banning of hand-held electronic devices but not these other distractions?

Durham police are getting desperate to slow drivers down – they’ve called in the reinforcements, in the form of teenagers! Reported by TheStar.com, drivers were offered a choice when pulled over in an innovative program designed to help deter speeding. Get a speeding ticket (a minimum fine of $90) or a lecture from a teen.

Only one of the 63 motorists opted for the speeding ticket. The rest listened to one-page essays by grade 11 law class students from Monsignor Paul Dwyer Secondary School, located near the high-collision intersection of Rossland Rd. W. and Stevenson Rd. in Oshawa.

Durham officer Keith Richards came up with the idea after realizing speeding tickets don’t work after four years as a traffic safety co-ordinator in Clarington. From TheStar.com:

The idea was to teach safe driving principles to both drivers and students, who included statistics, consequences of bad driving and personal tales in their messages delivered at a mobile command unit…

“This is a damn good idea,” said Ryan [one of the motorists pulled over], dabbing at her eyes. “It really touched me. It can save a life.”

The program empowers the students, gives drivers a choice, and provides education to both the students and drivers, new and seasoned. Despite its astounding success, the program is initiated infrequently because police prefer to have tangible evidence of offenders, such as a speeding ticket.

Advanced, cutting-edge multiple camera technology is taking the loophole out of a single camera system, reports The Calgary Sun. The result: drivers who drive even 10 – 20 km/h over the limit are guaranteed to get speeding tickets.

This photo radar technology is being tested in Britain and tracks the motorist from the minute the car enters a particular section of the road until the moment it leaves.

The system uses digital licence-plate recognition software to track the car and source the name and address of the (un)lucky motorist.

Ontario drivers don’t have to sweat just yet, though. It’s the province of Albert that’s attempting to pass legislation that will allow these cameras on the roads. In fact, they’ve already changed the law. They’re just waiting for the legislation to pass and expect the first fines to be issued in 2009.

Additionally, proponents of the system claim that its calculations actually err on the side of the motorist. The computerized cameras will be placed intermittently along a major road and calculate the average speed over a number of kilometers. The Calgary Sun illustrates how this works:

“A driver recorded at five points on the Deerfoot, doing 100, 105, 95, 100, and 115 km/h, would average out at 103 km/h — not fast enough to warrant a ticket.”

So what do you think, Readers? If Ontario implements this multiple camera system, will it slow you down?

Tuesday’s MetroNews article, “Doubts still riding racing law” confirm our late summer reports that the anti-racing law is still under the microscope, despite favourable statistics. Critics just aren’t buying into the positive assurances made by Ontario Premier Dalton McGuinty and Provincial police commissioner Julian Fantino that lower traffic fatalities are due to the effectiveness of this new traffic law.

It’s been over a year now that Ontario passed this street racing law and it immediately raised concerns from opponents who questioned whether these amendments are ‘unjustly punitive’ and in violation of the Charter of Rights. These questions appear to be justified based on an extremely low 33% conviction rate. MetroNews reports that one constitutional expert maintains statistics suggest critics were not off-base.

In one year, 8,459 drivers (source: Canadian Press) have been charged with street racing and 7,000 have had their licences suspended and their vehicles impounded. And no one is safe from this law – including drivers of all ages, police officers and even garbage trucks.

With a conviction rate now at 41%, fines from $2,000 to $10,000, and the threat of vehicles being impounded for a week, it should slow drivers down. TheRecord.com reports, however, that a daily average of 23 drivers caught speeding at 50 km/hr and over as compared to 40 per day from the onset of the legislation.

There have also been 100 fewer traffic-related deaths compared to the same time last year. And while there may be other factors affecting these stats, the fact remains: speed kills. OPP Constable David Woodford is firm in his belief that they are taking dangerous drivers off the road.

So what do you think, Readers, are the harsh repercussions of the Ontario racing law just, or unjust?

Montreal artist Michel de Broin was making a blatant statement about consumption when he transformed a luxury Buick Regal into a bicycle. But P.C. Derek Walsh didn’t appreciate the message when he spotted the strange looking car going 15 km/h on Toronto streets.

Walsh immediately pulled the Buick over, looked inside and saw that there was no floor, no engine and used candles for headlights. Caught in a YouTube video, the police officer looks in the vehicle, shakes his head and says, “Not even close to being legal.” He writes up a traffic ticket for operating an unsafe vehicle, seizes the car and leaves the artistic passengers stranded, wondering what to tell the Art Gallery.

Here is the YouTube video for your viewing pleasure:

Toronto Police Ticket Flinstone Car Art

As CityNews reported, Dean Baldwin, the driver of the ‘Flintstone Motor Art’, parked the Buick in front of Toronto’s traffic court ready to fight the traffic ticket. The traffic court judge threw out the case claiming that the modified Buick was no longer a vehicle and therefore the charge was inapplicable.

So as you can see through this example, with the proper defense, you can fight any traffic ticket and win. If you’d like the reassurance of having a professional handle your case, get Legal Action today!

It sounds like a board game but the city isn’t paying games. They are very serious in their new initiative of putting pedestrians before drivers and have proven it by implementing an experiment called the, “pedestrian scramble”.

On August 28^th, reports the globeandmail.com, one of the busiest intersections of Toronto, Yonge and Dundas, turned into a free-for-all-pedestrians. The traffic light configuration stops all vehicles in every direction to allow pedestrians to cross the street in any direction they please, including diagonally.

Drivers will have to wait up to almost a minute before they are allowed to proceed, where as before the longest wait time was 30 seconds. Green lights for drivers have been reduced by almost 10 seconds to allow more crossing time for pedestrians.

Other cities, like Montreal, Tokyo, San Fransisco and Miami, have already implemented the ‘pedestrian scramble’ as far back as the 1950s. These pedestrian scrambles have been widely accepted and have had pedestrians dancing in the streets. By the way, here in Toronto we call it ‘pedestrian priority phase,’ as the term, ‘scramble’ immediately brings to mind disorderly conduct.

Other Toronto intersections for future consideration are:

• Yonge and Bloor
• Bay and Bloor
• Bay and Dundas

The article explains that the whole point of the scramble is for pedestrian safety as it completely halts the possibility of vehicles turning into streams of pedestrians. As you may have noticed, green light advances for cars arrive just prior to pedestrian green lights. Many pedestrians begin crossing the street as soon as they notice opposing car traffic has the red light, forgetting about the advanced green for cars.

The enigma here is that at Yonge and Dundas, cars cannot make left hand turns. Essentially the pedestrian scramble here is more ‘symbolic’ than pragmatic. Pedestrians will still be able to cross when cars have their green light while at other intersections where cars are allowed to turn, pedestrians will have to wait for their special signal. Critics suggest that pedestrians may become impatient at these intersections, increasing the incidence of jaywalking and the danger of traffic accidents.

It’ll be interesting to see if this initiative actually benefits pedestrians, and if drivers are able to cope with their increased wait times.

In last week’s post, we reported how the Provincial authorities claim the roads have been made safer through the one-year-old street-racing legislation. But critics say this is only one of many factors affecting the lower incidence of traffic fatalities. High gas prices are a likely suspect, and one American study seems to verify this idea.

The Transportation Research Institute at the University of Michigan reported recent results from their study, which covers 12 month ending in April, and found that as gas prices rose, driving and fatalities declined. They predict that if the same pattern continues for the rest of the year, Americans will be driving on roads that haven’t been this safe since Kennedy moved into the White House.

From the wheels section of The Star:

Sivak, who used data from the National Safety Council, National Center for Health Statistics and the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration…predicts that highway deaths this year will drop below 37,000 for the first time since 1961 if the March and April trends continue. The government motor vehicle death count for 1961 totaled 36,285. The number of highway deaths peaked in 1972 at 55,600, then generally declined over the next two decades. For the past several years, the number has hovered above 42,000 a year.

NHTSA reported last week that motor vehicle deaths in the United States totaled 41,059 last year, the lowest level in more than a decade. And the Federal Highway Administration said Americans drove 12.2 billion fewer miles in June than a year earlier, the biggest monthly decrease in a downward trend that began in November.

Here’s what motor vehicular fatality trend experts say what’s happening:

• Drivers are reducing nonessential driving, at night and on weekends, which is not as safe as commuting in daytime and slowly in congested roads.
• Teenage and elderly drivers, who do not have disposable income, most likely are choosing more affordable travelling options.
• Rural routes, which have higher accident rates than urban highways, have seen traffic declines.
• Drivers are simply slowing down for the sake of fuel economy.

While this is an American study, we Canadian neighbours share similar economics with the States and it is no great leap to assume what affects them also affects us.

Interestingly, in another Star article, Stats Canada reported in July that deaths caused by motor vehicle accidents have fallen by 52% between 1979 and 2004. Apparently, the report suggested that this decrease was due to a hodgepodge of reasons, such as improvements in car safety features and the crackdown on drunk driving and speeding.

So this information begs the questions: Just how much has Ontario’s speed-racing law contributed to making our roads safe?

As the Toronto Sun reported last week, the number of traffic fatalities dropped 30% from last year. Fantino is crediting Ontario’s restrictive new street-racing legislation passed earlier this year. OPP Sgt. Cam Wooley concurs, saying something must be working as this has been the first time in his 30 years that he’s seen a decrease this significant.

Unfortunately, the same article reports that a 27-year-old was caught speeding in a V-8 Aston Martin Vantage going 218 km/h on Hwy 407. This extraordinary incidence, along with others caught speeding 50 km and over, is interfering in Fantino’s goal of 0 fatalities, “It certainly does not have to be at the number it is at…I don’t call them accidents anymore. They are caused occurrences.”

From the torontosun.com:

He [Fantino] is right. You look at any of the ones [traffic fatalities] this summer and you usually find a reason — speed, alcohol, dangerous driving. The OPP see crazy stuff every day right here in the GTA. “We stopped four motorists for doing more than 50 km over the posted speed limit and in another situation, a young woman is fighting for her life in hospital as a result of a crash on Hwy. 404 where the driver was (allegedly) well over the posted speed limit and was racing,” said Fantino. “It’s one more example of the tragedy that results when someone shows complete disregard for the law, their own life and that of others on the roads.”

The article continues saying that Fantino is determined to lower traffic fatalities even more than the astounding 30% we’ve seen so far. This means a promise for:

…more enforcement, more tough love on the roads and more speeding tickets.

Since Section 172 of the Highway Traffic Act came on board last September, nearly one year ago, more than 7,500 drivers have been charged. “This is good legislation,” Fantino said in his release. “Traffic safety needs to be a joint effort among the police, the justice system and the driving public. We’re doing our jobs; we just hope the others will do theirs.”

Critics argue that the current statistics are skewed because of lower gas prices affecting driving habits of Canadians, meaning there are fewer cars on the roads so less chance of traffic fatalities. Fantino responded to this criticism by saying that they (the police) don’t see any less traffic.

So the question remains, is the crackdown on Ontario speeding laws and some of its harsh measures really affecting the public’s attitude towards speeding, or is this decrease in traffic fatalities just coincidence? As always, we would love to hear your comments.

The major news story in Toronto last week was the devastating explosions and fire at the Sunrise Propane Energy site by the Keele and Finch area. The disaster saw thousands of residents evacuate the area and caused serious damage to nearby homes and businesses. As residents begin to return home, and the authorities are investigating the cause of the blasts, lawsuits are also getting underway, taking aim at both Sunrise Propane and the Province of Ontario. From CTV:

Two Toronto law firms say they’ll file papers on Wednesday to start a $300 million class-action lawsuit on behalf of business owners and residents affected by this weekend’s propane blasts.

The City of Toronto and Sunrise Propane Energey Group Inc., the site of Sunday’s massive explosions, will be named on a notice of action, according to the website classproceedings.ca

The website states that the Toronto firms of Stevensons LLP and Bogoroch & Associates also “intend to commence an action against the Province of Ontario.”

Technical Standards and Safety Authority, a provincial agency, is also expected to be named in the suit after it and the province receive a required 60 day notice, according to the site. The suit will be filed “in respect of the devastating propane gas explosions which occurred on August 10, 2008,” said the website.

Questions of negligence, nuisance and trespass are likely to be brought up in the cases against Sunrise and the City of Toronto. Whether the $300 million in compensation will cover the losses of the thousands of residents in the area remains to be seen.

This news comes amid Toronto Mayor David Miller’s call for a review of the city’s zoning policies to question the safety of industrial facilities in the vicinity of residential areas.

“Is it wise to have a propane facility of this kind immediately adjacent to residential properties?” Miller asked rhetorically at a press conference on Monday.

“Obviously, in light of what happened, the answer is ‘no.’”

Given the magnitude of the incident, it is likely that more lawsuits will be made following the release of the investigation’s findings. The risk of asbestos poisoning coming from structural damage and concerns over air quality are likely to be the root of future grievances against the city and the province.

Were you near the blast or know someone who was? How has the explosion affected you? What action, legally or otherwise, would you take against the city? Feel free to leave your thoughts in the comments section below.

Ontario Transportation Minister Jim Bradley has recently hinted at new legislation coming this fall that would crackdown on the use of personal electronic devices while driving. From the Toronto Star:

The new law could range from an outright ban on use of electronics while driving to measures to toughen Ontario’s existing laws. Currently, a driver convicted of driving “without due care and attention” can face fines of up to $1,000 and a prison term of up to six months.

The idea behind the “distracted driver” legislation is to reduce potentially deadly traffic accidents in a fast-moving environment where multi-tasking can be dangerous.

Members of the government and law enforcement are welcoming the news, citing the urgent need of redirecting drivers’ attention to the road. With new devices like the iPhone featuring multiple applications and touch screen interfaces, the potential for distraction is all the higher.

Several tragic traffic accidents in the last few years had involved cell phone use in the lead up to fatal crashes. These incidents had raised the attention of the coroner’s office as early as 2002 and have also persuaded Premier Dalton McGuinty, who has previously rejected calls for such bans, to revise his position.

If Ontario’s lawmakers decide to pursue a ban, or include ‘cell phone’ use as an item in police reports surveying a crash, the province would join the ranks of Quebec, Nova Scotia and Newfoundland who currently have fines in effect.

The full details of the proposed legislation have yet to be revealed to the public, but more information is expected as the summer draws to a close. You can be sure Legal Action will be on top of the developments, as these changes can have very serious effects on your driving habits and on the state of your insurance if you get into a accident.

Stay tuned to this blog for more news on this, and other legislative proposals.