If city council votes for it, speed limits across Vancouver could drop to 30 kilometres per hour on side streets, but one councillor wants to take road safety even further.
A staff report going up for debate next week looks at the feasibility of pushing down speed limits to 30 from the default of 50 km/h on streets without a centre line in residential areas.
It points to successes in other cities that have seen crashes and pedestrian injuries and deaths decline.
However, Vancouver Coun. Lucy Maloney wants even more done, saying she will table a motion next week that would overhaul the city’s Moving Towards Zero Safety Action Plan.
The road safety program has been in place since 2016, which is meant to reduce motor vehicle injuries and deaths.
Maloney’s motion, entitled Developing a Vision Zero Road Safety Policy and Action Plan, envisions “shifting the city’s existing approach to road safety by taking evidence-based action to achieve its target of zero motor vehicle deaths and serious injuries.”
The OneCity Vancouver councillor says it is time for an evidence-based approach.
“Road violence injures thousands of people every year, and for the last decade, it has claimed at least 10 lives annually,” said Maloney. “I reject the idea that this is inevitable or acceptable. Zero deaths and injuries on our streets is an ambitious goal, and it is a goal we can achieve.”
“We know what works to make our roads safe for everyone who uses them. We just need to do it.”Maloney wants city staff to take a “ruthless and evidence-based lens” to existing road safety interventions.
“If an investment in road safety is not proven to result in measurable safety outcomes, it ought to be eliminated, and its resources ought to be redirected to interventions that do improve safety,” she said.
In practice, she argues, this means moving away from ineffective interventions, like campaigns that try to convince pedestrians to wear high-visibility gear, and toward more effective interventions that address dangerous driver behaviour.
“We need to look at what really works, what has been proven to work, and not concentrate on things that every parent teaches their kids from the minute they can understand — to be careful crossing the road,” she told 1130 NewsRadio.
She would rather see resources go toward measures such as road redesigns, speed reductions, and improving visibility at intersections.
Maloney’s motion and the staff report on speed limits both go before city council on July 9.
source & photo: CityNews
