A private citizen, and member of the Safe Travel Planning Committee at a West End Ottawa School, spoke with the Premier on his personal cell phone. (Yes, you too can call him on his phone number 647-612-3673!) Premier Ford made a few fairly eyebrow-raising claims:
Ford is promising to a) a personally visit schools with their local mayor b) provide provincial funding for geometric road modifications and that c) “it will be installed in 2 weeks”.
He also claimed that “they (the province) did a study”, and they (the province) have “consulted fire and police, who have said that speed bumps won’t slow them down”.
(Update: we can provide a transcript of the call if you are interested in hearing the entire exchange.)
As the caller mentions in their correspondence with me, it is “unlikely that any study has been undertaken as he describes”. If the province had done a study, why are we only hearing about it now? Wouldn’t it have helped the government’s case with journalists?
Regarding speed bumps and fire and police, I wonder if the Premier is aware that a lot of schools are alongside major arterial roads? The major reason municipalities were resorting to speed cameras is because other traffic calming measures such as speed bumps are not allowed, and are not a good idea, on arterial roads. And it’s not just fire and police that are impacts, so are buses, streetcars and so on.
I’ve never seen a single municipal project turn around in 2 weeks. Though I’ll be pleasantly surprised if the Premier can somehow get all the geometric road modifications done in 2 weeks across all the municipalities in Ontario that have speed cameras. That includes getting municipal approvals, plans drafted, funding secured, work bids advertised and accepted, and actually do the installations. Even if everyone was getting the same thing (you get a speed bump! you get a speed bump! And you get a speed bump!) this would be a really impressive feat.
I look forward to the Premier fulfilling his promises to keep our kids safe. It’s the least he can do after ripping out the speed cameras.
Hello, thanks for starting this campaign . But recently despite the popularity, I haven’t seen any updates. Are you giving up on fighting for people’s lives?
Folks are still fighting this. It’s now law but people are still trying to find a way to change it. One way is to call Premier Ford directly on his personal cell phone 647-612-3673
With around 9k in the signatures, isn’t it better to increase the pressure with our collective voices? No hope in regards?
my letter to editor in Toronto Star
https://www.thestar.com/opinion/letters-to-the-editor/speed-cameras-keep-us-all-safer-its-as-simple-as-that/article_35f0975e-edec-4c50-9963-54945ded11e4.html