Quote:
Originally Posted by freeweed
I care. Pandering to stupid, ignorant beliefs, just to make people "feel better", and justifying it with "it's not THAT much of an inconvenience" - we're supposed to be an educated, enlightened society for —'s sake. Not a bunch of ignorant fools praying that somehow our actions "might make us feel safer".
Instead, why don't we actually try to EDUCATE people on what REAL threats to their children are. Texting while driving. Rushing around to 6 after-school events because you just can't say no to little Johnny's desire to play 5 sports this year. Cramming 300 cars into a residential street several times a day, because we think that an 8 year old walking home from school is somehow "dangerous". There are a million things people do every day that are legitimately endangering children, and yet we're focussed so strongly on "speed kills" that we're actively ignoring real threats.
It's exactly like the modern pedophilia scare. Children are being raised in a culture of abject fear of strangers, when all evidence conclusively points to family/friends/authority figures as being the real danger. And the only real logic presented is "well it makes me FEEL safer, so it's justified". Hell, the entire anti-vaccination movement runs on this exact "logic", and it's KILLING KIDS RIGHT NOW.
Sorry, I just can't handle the culture of idiots we're creating, all in the name of "safety".
Also, from a purely mathematical standpoint - if every single person in a city is inconvenienced by a mere 36 seconds, that adds up to thousands of lost hours. And if it's literally for nothing but a "feeling of safety" - it's indefensible.
Show me, compared to other cities and previous decades, how 50 km/h is dangerous for kids. And how Calgary has saved many lives and prevented many injuries as a result of our strict 30 km/h enforcement. Let's see some actual evidence that this is even needed. I'd also be curious as to the money spent over say the last decade, in terms of signage, enforcement, education programs, City committee meetings (or whatever is involved in terms of setting something like this up), etc. I bet we've spent hundreds of thousands of dollars, if not millions on the whole thing.
Hell, when was the last time we spent any money on a campaign to teach kids "look both ways before crossing the street"? Or have we just become so passive that we assume that 30 km/h will magically remove that need?
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I'd say that the cost to have a police officer at every schoolyard ticketing is astronomical. Unfortunately, sometimes it has taken a child's death like the three year old that was killed at the C-train state before some of the new safety signage was put up.
I like the education approach. The four e's of transportation safety are: education, enforcement, engineering (infrastructure) and evaluation (review process). I get the sense that the education and evaluation process are so dysfunctional in Calgary now that some community groups are resorting to the dark side of social engineering (for instance like the over regulated 30 kmphr in Sunnyside proposal).
And some of the complaints that pedestrians have are legitimate including the fatal hit and run earlier this year, or the major hit and run incident that happened on 17 Ave last night. There are about 100 hit and runs that happen annually in Calgary (most of which aren't reported in the media), and you can't create safer conditions for pedestrians always through more enforcement or engineering stupidly slow road speeds.
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