Have you ever heard of a red aluminum octagon at the end of a post, commonly known as a “stop-stop”, which caused the death of a pedestrian?
Everything is possible, but as a general rule, these panels are rather part of the classic arsenal of protection for those who walk the streets. With speed bumps, sidewalks, ledges, trees, central islands and raised intersections. However, we procrastinate and sometimes we wait too long before adding them, as if they presented any danger or enormous disadvantages.
The most recent example comes from the Saint-Michel district. There is no stop sign at the intersection of rue Bélair and 22e Ave. Even if a daycare center is there. Even if citizens worried about their safety have been asking for it to be installed for years.
You know the saying: what had to happen… happened.
On June 22, a 22-year-old student was hit by a heavy truck there. Dilan Kaya was walking to Tim Hortons to buy iced coffees. Her father had given her $20 which she never had time to use. His body was torn apart in front of the daycare, on the thick yellow lines that mark the pedestrian crossing on the asphalt.
It was 27 days ago. Since then, his father, Cuma Kaya, has practically lived on the premises. Next to a photo of his daughter who died, candles and flowers, the man of Turkish origin waits for the police to come and explain to him what happened.
He’s furious that he hasn’t heard from anyone, he told me over and over again. “I want someone serious to come see me! »
Reading the story of the events, my heart in pieces for this handicapped and inconsolable man, I immediately thought of little Mariia Legenkovska. The 7-year-old Ukrainian died after being hit by a vehicle last December, on her way to her school in the Ville-Marie district, in similar circumstances.
In this neighborhood too, citizens find that cars drive too fast. Fearing the worst, they multiplied the steps with the City to calm the traffic. They have been asking for the addition of curbs and speed bumps for years. Without success.
And in both neighborhoods, residents have pointed to motorists who are impatient and in a hurry looking for shortcuts because their usual route no longer works due to roadwork. This leads them to take residential streets, without necessarily adapting their driving to this environment.
Faced with these two similar stories of broken lives, we need answers. We need to understand how years of civic action can come to nothing.
I doubt that citizens are multiplying emails and phone calls to demand traffic calming measures that are totally useless and devoid of common sense. When a parent has to manage lunches, soccer practices and homework, and he takes the time to contact his city knowing that his chances of being heard are slim, it means that the message must be important.
Maybe by listening too much to the citizens, we will install one or two superfluous red octagons. Two or three moderately necessary speed bumps. Maybe. But what’s the worst thing it could cause?
It can take three years to think about medical assistance in dying or pregnancy for others, these are complex and divisive social issues. But this delay is inadequate when it comes to installing objects to reduce speed on a residential street, the cost of which is not staggering. Moreover, it is possible to do very quickly. We have proof of this in the aftermath of tragedies when signs suddenly appear on the scene.
Unfortunately, the decision to install a simple stop sign would have become very complex due to the Engineers Act coming into force in September 2021. “You now need a marking plan sealed by an engineer, a plan which itself stems from an expensive traffic analysis carried out by a traffic engineer”, explained on Facebook the municipal councilor Sylvain Ouellet reacting to the text of The Press on the death of Dilan Kaya which occurred in his district of François-Perrault.
The municipal administration has also mandated SNC-Lavalin to assess the possibility of adding stops, including some on rue Bélair.
Mariia and Dilan strike the imagination because they had their whole lives ahead of them. But dozens of pedestrians die each year on the roads of Quebec and the latest assessment is not encouraging. In mid-June, the SAAQ informed us that 79 pedestrians lost their lives in 2022, which represents an increase of 23% compared to the average of the previous five years (64 deaths).
The car fleet is changing, but the layout of the streets is not adapting at the same pace.
If the trend continues, no more cars will be sold in Quebec in 2028, calculates the HEC Montreal Energy Chair. In 2021, SUVs, vans and pickups already accounted for 71% of vehicle sales. These vehicles, which are heavier, taller and have a larger blind spot area, leave pedestrians much less chance of survival in collisions.
Cities must therefore take all means to act accordingly and to react quickly to citizens’ requests.
The stop-stop of too much will do less damage than the one that is missing.