Traffic Control Lights Are The Only Solution...!

Here is s a note from Mark Rees, a local Oxton-Oriole neighborhood resident and initiator of the Oxton-Oriole safety Petition, who writes...

Hello Folks:

In looking through all the neighbourhood emails (also see the Archive links on right side-bar) I am more convinced then ever that the installation of Traffic Control lights offers the only real solution for protecting our local pedestrians from serious injury which I think residents all agree is inevitable.

Oriole-Oxton is the perfect test case as to whether or not the City is serious about pedestrian safety let alone its desire to adhere to its own principles as espoused by the Toronto Pedestrian Charter.

As the emails suggest our piece of Toronto has been seriously "down-graded". I believe a city is only as good as its capacity to create a “people” (my term) environment, or more succinctly, a cities measure of success can be found in the degree its public places, cultural facilities, museums, living areas, public transportation, and of course its residential spaces, etc, add value to the whole.

I would like to see Toronto strive harder to reach this “people” orientated environment. “Forcing” a highway through a long established neighbourhood against the wishes of its residents is to say the least “car-headed.” Yes, traffic must move (enlightened cites would say public transport must move), but unfortunately for the city the local residents did not get out of the way. We’re still here and the City needs to respect us too!

Oxton-Oriole is in fact a 4-2-4 lane bottleneck and to pump 20,000 cars a day into this bottleneck and expect nobody to notice (or wanting to notice) the traffic impact (safety, noise, pollution) on local residents is of course folly. Where will traffic volumes be in a few years – 30,000?

Traffic control lights were only installed at Killberry and Oxton after someone was hit by a car (fortunately not seriously). With the Oxton-Oriole intersection the City is for now, just lucky. I hope the City will take pro-active action and begin the process towards installation of traffic control lights as of September 13th!

Regards, Mark Rees

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