TORONTO -- Fifty cameras are being installed on Toronto roads “notorious for speeding.”
On Monday morning, Toronto Mayor John Tory unveiled a new sign reading “municipal speed camera coming soon” along Renforth Drive, near Torrington Drive, in Etobicoke.
This location is where one of 50 signs is being installed throughout the city. The spots were decided by officials based on evidence complied through tests.
Each ward in Toronto will have two cameras capturing and recording images of vehicles travelling in excess speed.
Tory said the Etobicoke street was chosen because “it was a place where speeding was something that had been well known to residents.”
“This very place was one of the places we tested the photo radar, the automated speed enforcement, as part of the lead up to its implementation today,” he said.
During the tests, Tory said officials noted that “majority of drivers were speeding” in that specific area, including a vehicle reportedly going 202 km/h in the 40 km/h zone.
“I think this technology is going to help us,” Tory said. “In 50 places, for starters, to actually address that and to cause people to do the one thing that I’ve said all along, which is to change their behaviour and stop speeding.”
Ahead of the camera being installed and tickets being issued to drivers, provincial regulations required the city to put up a warning.
“Beginning with 90 days from today, we will be issuing tickets,” Tory said. “I think even the signs will cause people to slow down.”
Prior to the installation of the sign, deputy mayor Stephen Holyday, who represents Etobicoke-Centre, said markers and other signage were put in place to advise drivers to slow down in the area that includes schools, parks, libraries, and places of worship.
“A lot of people have approached me over the year and said ‘councillor, what can we do to improve the situation here, to protect the students, to protect the vulnerable users of the road,’” he said.
Holyday and Tory said these next steps were long awaited and part of the city's Vision Zero road safety plan, which aims at reducing traffic-related fatalities and serious injuries on Toronto streets.
