Saturday 15 November 2008

It's Toronto Pedestrian Safety Week!









Toronto has suffered a second serious pedestrian-vehicle accident in a week that's been devoted to promoting pedestrian safety. "It's two days into the campaign and already we've had a fatality yesterday and a serious collision today," Const. Mig Roberts told ctvtoronto.ca on Wednesday.

One day later:

It is becoming something of an epidemic in Toronto - the third accident involving a pedestrian in as many days.

But not to worry. These were just “accidents” and the press reports all suggest it was the walkers’ fault for crossing roads in front of poor, helpless drivers who were doing nothing more than steer a ton of metal at speed through a busy urban environment.

Oh, and Toronto is also a dangerous city for cyclists.

This last episode seems to have been a case of road rage: Many local residents quickly categorized the incident as a violent manifestation of the animosity between car drivers and bicycle riders in Canada's largest city.

The Toronto driver who apparently deliberately ran down a cyclist was a taxi driver. The same thing happened in Glasgow: A TAXI driver who knocked down a cyclist he thought had made an offensive gesture towards him was jailed for four months.