With cameras up, drivers slow down

Toronto’s photo radar project bringing speeders in line, research shows

After more than a year and 277,000-plus tickets, Toronto’s 50 photo radar cameras are slowing down speeders and helping make streets safer, researchers said Tuesday.

But in a grim reminder that pedestrians remain at risk, shortly before the announcement an elderly woman was struck and killed by a driver in a Don Mills parking lot.

Later, on Lawrence Avenue East in Scarborough, Mayor John Tory marked the first full year of operation of the “automated speed enforcement” cameras that snap photos of speeding cars that, after police review, trigger tickets.

Tory lobbied the Ontario government for years before municipalities were allowed to use the cameras in designated school zones and community safety zones where the speed limit is less than 80 km/h. The cameras are now part of the city’s “Vision Zero” campaign to eliminate pedestrian and cyclist deaths.

Hailing preliminary results from an ongoing study of the cameras’ impact by the Hospital for Sick Children and Ryerson University, Tory said: “It is very clear — when cameras go up, drivers do in fact slow down.”

Tory raised the possibility of adding more cameras to the current two per city ward, which are moved every four to five months.

He said use of photo radar remains “polarizing” and he wanted proof of their effectiveness before looking at adding more — something now under “active discussion.”

Preliminary findings of the study using city data to compare vehicle speeds before and after placement of the cameras included:

á The percentage of vehicles speeding in 40 km/h zones dropped from 49 per cent before the cameras were installed to 28 per cent in November 2020, after they had been snapping for four months;

á During a warning period in early 2020, before the cameras were operating, just over half of vehicles travelling through the 50 zones were speeding. Once the cameras started triggering tickets, the percentage of vehicles speeding dropped to 36 per cent;

á The cameras also seemed to reduce how much people were speeding over the limit. Before the cameras, vehicles averaged 18 km/h over the limit in 40

km/hr zones. That dropped to just 6 km/h over the limit. The reduction in 30 km/h speed zones was less, from 12 km/h over the limit to 9 km/h.

Linda Rothman, a researcher co-leading the study, told reporters that photo radar has triggered “a remarkable reduction in traffic speeding near our schools,” adding “excessive speed kills.”

But she acknowledged that Lawrence Avenue East behind her — straight and wide, with six vehicle lanes and no bike lanes — remains a “mini-highway” despite the photo radar camera snapping tickets vehicle owners later get in the mail.

Most of Toronto’s pedestrian deaths happen on similar suburban streets, especially those with long stretches between traffic lights where pedestrians can cross.

Road safety advocates welcome photo radar and want more cameras on city streets, but say the city also needs to be more aggressive in changing roadways to slow drivers and reduce pedestrian and cyclist carnage.

Jessica Spieker of Friends and Families for Safe Streets, an advocacy group started by relatives of people killed on Toronto roads, said the deaths and resulting anguish for family members should be a wake-up call for anyone fighting safety measures.