Calgary Speed limits to be standard 30km/hr?

[Weitz]

Originally Posted by Resolute 14

Elbow isn't a residential street, so isn't part of the original proposal.

Its already 40 so I'm sure it will.

[Resolute 14]

It's only 40 for a short stretch where rich NIMBYs live. Not the other 20km of the road.

[CliffFletcher]

Originally Posted by Resolute 14

It's only 40 for a short stretch where rich NIMBYs live. Not the other 20km of the road.

Yeah, the traffic calming and slowing measures on Elbow are localized to Elbow Park and Roxboro. You don't see long stretches of playground zones, 40 km/h zones, tree-lined boulevards, and vintage lamposts in Haysboro or Southwood.

[T-Dog]

The more I have thought about this proposal, the more concerned I am that there has been a lack of information given to citizens before it could be passed and implemented. I still haven't seen any concrete info on what is considered a "non-collector" street. I'm sure we could be surprised by the number of streets that would end up with a 30 km/hr limit. This seems entirely ridiculous to me - I can't imaging having to commute around the city driving 30 km/hr on many streets, not to mention the added stress and cost of tickets for speeding on a low speed street where you didn't expect it. We could reduce fatalities and injuries to zero if we ban cars, but that just isn't practical. I've written to my City councillor to express my concern about the lack of consultation and information on this and encourage others to do the same.

[Bunk]

Originally Posted by T-Dog

The more I have thought about this proposal, the more concerned I am that there has been a lack of information given to citizens before it could be passed and implemented. I still haven't seen any concrete info on what is considered a "non-collector" street. I'm sure we could be surprised by the number of streets that would end up with a 30 km/hr limit. This seems entirely ridiculous to me - I can't imaging having to commute around the city driving 30 km/hr on many streets, not to mention the added stress and cost of tickets for speeding on a low speed street where you didn't expect it. We could reduce fatalities and injuries to zero if we ban cars, but that just isn't practical. I've written to my City councillor to express my concern about the lack of consultation and information on this and encourage others to do the same.

Here were examples the mover provided:

https://twitter.com/druhfarrell/stat...399529472?s=21

[getbak]

Originally Posted by Bunk

Here were examples the mover provided:

https://twitter.com/druhfarrell/stat...399529472?s=21

Which still doesn't help because it doesn't give clarity as to exactly what a collector is.

Hawkstone and Hawkwood Drives are exactly what I would consider to be a collector road. However, on that example map, it shows both of those streets having their speed reduced.

On the Acadia map, it shows Acadia, Fairmont, and Bonaventure Drives plus 90th Ave all as collectors (which they should be).

I don't see any discernible difference between the collectors in Acadia and the apparent non-collectors in Hawkwood.

[Bunk]

Originally Posted by getbak

Which still doesn't help because it doesn't give clarity as to exactly what a collector is.

Hawkstone and Hawkwood Drives are exactly what I would consider to be a collector road. However, on that example map, it shows both of those streets having their speed reduced.

On the Acadia map, it shows Acadia, Fairmont, and Bonaventure Drives plus 90th Ave all as collectors (which they should be).

I don't see any discernible difference between the collectors in Acadia and the apparent non-collectors in Hawkwood.

Good point. Upon second look, that confuses me as well.

[Ducay]

Poorly thought out idea spearheaded by a couple of poorly thought out Councillors. No surprise here. 15-30 second delay on my commute, ya right.

[Erick Estrada]

Originally Posted by DoubleK

I 1000% support the lowering of the speed limit. Nobody should be driving 50kph through a residential area. The consequences of a collision are way too high. If you are in a hurry to get somewhere, leave earlier.

The moment you get in your car your risk of death increases greatly. Should we outlaw cars? Five people are killed by sharks annually so obviously swimming in the ocean can have high consequences. Maybe we should hunt and kill all sharks that are a threat to man. Today it's 50 to 30 km/hr. Tomorrow someone will say that x amount of people died at 30 km/hr and it should be reduced to 20 km/hr. You have to be somewhat sensible about things. I'm open to the possibility of a reduction to 40 km/h but 50 to 30 km/hr is too drastic when there isn't really any evidence to support a 40% speed reduction.

Like I said before the last time Druh rammed through something she believed strongly in it came at the cost of the health of my children's teeth. I'm not willing to let her once again have a major impact on Calgarian's daily lives. She needs to realize this is the city of Calgary not the city of Druh.

[CaptainYooh]

Originally Posted by getbak

Which still doesn't help because it doesn't give clarity as to exactly what a collector is...

It's whatever the transportation planner thinks, of course. Depends on his mood at the time too.

[CaptainYooh]

Originally Posted by Erick Estrada

...You have to be somewhat sensible about things. I'm open to the possibility of a reduction to 40 km/h but 50 to 30 km/hr is too drastic ...

See, that's the whole frickin' point of this motion. They get us all riled up and mad about 30, so that you can feel better when they've "listened to the people" and only reduced it to 40. This has nothing to do with safety. It's all about pandering to vocal minorities and facilitating increased ticket revenues along the way.

[Erick Estrada]

Originally Posted by CaptainYooh

See, that's the whole frickin' point of this motion. They get us all riled up and mad about 30, so that you can feel better when they've "listened to the people" and only reduced it to 40. This has nothing to do with safety. It's all about pandering to vocal minorities and facilitating increased ticket revenues along the way.

Well 10 km/hr is sensible and not something I'm willing to go to war against. Dropping the speed limit by almost half is simply too rash and makes me question what's going on in the minds of some of these councilors. Why is it so important to them to try and force such drastic change? Did one or two of them have an incident related to their family or friend on a residential road that's spearheaded this? I'm just curious of the logic they are using to go to such drastic measures when there's no evidence to show there's a growing issue with traffic related deaths on residential streets. Why is this such an issue today?

[GaiJin]

Originally Posted by Erick Estrada

Well 10 km/hr is sensible and not something I'm willing to go to war against. Dropping the speed limit by almost half is simply too rash and makes me question what's going on in the minds of some of these councilors. Why is it so important to them to try and force such drastic change? Did one or two of them have an incident related to their family or friend on a residential road that's spearheaded this? I'm just curious of the logic they are using to go to such drastic measures when there's no evidence to show there's a growing issue with traffic related deaths on residential streets. Why is this such an issue today?

Well, now you're all riled up about speed limits, and not talking about the Olympics negatively with other people.

[zhulander]

Originally Posted by llwhiteoutll

So they are starting out by twisting the stats to support their desired outcome then.

Saying that you need to lower residential limits to 30kph because 50% of collisions happen on collector and residential roads is disingenuous. They have the stats for residential collisions, so why are they not using that statistic to justify their position? I'd suspect that they are so low that they needed to lump in collectors to bring the number up to something they can make a fuss about.

They also don't seem to differentiate between collisions where the vehicle was at fault versus a pedestrian at fault, nor do they propose a solution to reduce the amount of collisions caused by pedestrians, even though that represents 50% of all collisions.

I don't know why they didn't just say 35%.

Pedestrian Collision by Road Type:

2013
Residential 189
Collector 176
Arterial (Major) 162
Skeletal (Expressway) 14

2014
Residential 181
Collector 167
Arterial (Major) 156
Skeletal (Expressway) 14

2015
Residential 159
Collector 162
Arterial (Major) 137
Skeletal (Expressway) 10

2016
Residential 162
Collector 182
Arterial (Major) 145
Skeletal (Expressway) 18

2017
Residential 140
Collector 159
Arterial (Major) 131
Skeletal (Expressway) 15


From: https://www.shanekeating.ca/2016/07/07/res-safety/

[TheAlpineOracle]

I think we should get rid of the c-train, it’s hurts far too many people. Unacceptable. We need this to be saved from ourselves.

[llwhiteoutll]

Originally Posted by DoubleK

I 1000% support the lowering of the speed limit. Nobody should be driving 50kph through a residential area. The consequences of a collision are way too high. If you are in a hurry to get somewhere, leave earlier.

So if you agree with dropping the limit and only affecting roads where 8% of pedestrian collisions occur, you must also support dropping the speed limit on the roads where the other 92% of collisions occur as well?


I'd bet if Druh was forced to show accurate stats to try and support this, no one except the "if it saves one life" folks would be left backing her up.

[bizaro86]

Originally Posted by puffnstuff

We should use this speed limit sign money we seem to have and put flouride back in the water instead.

No, we're only willing to spend money on things with dubious safety benefits.

If there's a scientific health consensus, including from health professionals against their own economic interest, then we can't afford it.

[DoubleK]

Originally Posted by llwhiteoutll

So if you agree with dropping the limit and only affecting roads where 8% of pedestrian collisions occur, you must also support dropping the speed limit on the roads where the other 92% of collisions occur as well?

Nobody needs to be going 50kph on a cul-de-sac.

You don't need statistics to tell you that.

[#-3]

Originally Posted by DoubleK

Nobody needs to be going 50kph on a cul-de-sac.

You don't need statistics to tell you that.

An nobody does 50 in a cul-de-sac. Speeds limits are virtually meaningless on a 200m long road, people could not get up to speed if they wanted to, and the roads cannot be monitored, even if the police wanted to. We are really talking about is the community named Ways & Blvds (or in older communities the numbered streets & aves).

If this was really about pedestrian safety before looking at residential speed limits they would;
1) paint more cross walk lines

2) put in more pedestrian controlled signals

3) improve medians in a way that would discourage jaywalking

4) allocate a greater portion of traffic enforcement resources to illegal turns or ignoring traffic signals (ex. running yellows, ignoring no right on red signs). ostensibly reducing enforcement of speed limits on roads like Stoney and Deerfoot where they are at best randomly taxing people while obstructing the typical flow of traffic, but that would just be a side benefit.

[4X4]

This is one of those things that individual opinions vary mostly because of personal situation. If you live down a road that is already quiet, then you have no reason to think that it's a problem. I've lived in places that this would be a complete waste of time, so I get that side of the argument, but I've also seen places in the city where it makes a lot of sense.

Since Druh Farrell is going to get raked over this, I'll take an example from her neighbourhood to make my point. I did a job on 15th st NW, on the portion that runs parallel to 14th from Kensington Rd. to 5th (6th?) st. NW. Nice, inner city street with cool older houses, infills, mature trees, parked cars, etc. I wasn't always there at the same time of day, but for the few minutes I'd be there daily, there'd be at least one or two cars ripping their way up the street as a shortcut to avoid the crappy traffic on 14th. Over the course of months, I pretty much concluded that dozens and dozens of cars use this street daily, for the same reason.

I don't think most of those cars were exceeding 50kph, but man does 50 seem way too fast for that street. Some of the days I'd get there during morning or afternoon kids-walking-to-school/home time, and it would actually piss me off to see these people blast up that road so fast.

Maybe there aren't any recorded deaths of children or elderly or teenagers wearing earphones on that street, but if I ever saw one on the news, I would not be surprised at all. And I would not mind one bit if that street, and others like it, were reduced to 30 to discourage it being used as a traffic shortcut. AFAIC, throw a multanova on it and nab the people that still blast through. Cash cow? Sure. But at least this cash cow eventually creates tangible safety improvements, unlike the stupid multanova on Stoney at Metis every single day.