June 7, 1999

To:Chairman and Members of Scarborough Community Council

From:Gary Welsh, Director, Transportation Services, Works and Emergency Services, District 4

Subject:Proposed Community Safety Zone on Fairfax Crescent, Scarborough Bluffs

Purpose:

To comment on the status of the City-wide trial of Community Safety Zones and the appropriateness of installing a Community Safety Zone on Fairfax Crescent.

Funding Sources, Financial Implications and Impact Statement:

Not applicable.

Recommendations:

It is recommended that this report be received for information.

Council Reference/Background/History:

At the meeting of May 26, 1999, Scarborough Community Council considered a staff report entitled Traffic Calming on Fairfax Crescent, dated May 11, 1999. Community Council deferred consideration of the report until their June 22, 1999 meeting, and requested a report be submitted at the same meeting addressing the application of a Community Safety Zone onto Fairfax Crescent.

Comments and/or Discussion and/or Justification:

There is a detailed discussion of the recent history of traffic calming initiatives on Fairfax Crescent in the staff report dated May 11, 1999 being presented in conjunction with this report. Within that report staff are recommending a polling process to elicit the opinions of area residents with respect to the installation of speed humps on Fairfax Crescent.

Community Safety Zones are a brand new traffic device which the Province of Ontario made available to municipalities late last year, through amendments to the Highway Traffic Act. In the Fall of 1998 staff reported on the details of this new device to the Urban Environment and Development Committee and recommended that a program of trial installations be undertaken early in 1999 with a staff report on their effectiveness in the Summer of 1999. An interim report addressing this trial should be presented to the Works Committee in the near future.

What are Community Safety Zones?

Community Safety Zones are sections of roads where, once controlled by by-law and signage, drivers who are convicted of one of a variety of offences is subject to a set fine which is higher than the fine for the same offence in a normal location. The set fine increases are generally either 38% or 72% above the normal set fine. The Province did not provide criteria for the selection of these zones, so Council adopted the following staff proposals:

"In order to focus the designation of Community Safety Zones to locations where they would be of greatest deterrent benefit, staff used the following criteria to assess candidate locations:

i)there is a history of repeated offences of similar nature;

ii)enforcement alone has not been effective; and

iii)other mitigating measures are inappropriate or have not been effective.

Staff anticipated that the public would be exposed to the highest safety risks at the following locations:

iv)at high collision locations;

v)adjacent to elementary schools; and

vi)at elementary school crossings."

After consulting with the vast majority of City Councillors on this issue at the end of last summer, a priority list of approximately one trial location per Community Council Area was identified for Council's approval. A further list of 50 locations was identified and is now "on hold" pending the outcome of the trial of the first few Community Safety Zones. The location of the approved zone in the Scarborough Community Area is East Avenue, which was signed early in 1999. Staff are presently conducting follow-up studies in an attempt to measure the impact of the zone, and these results should be included in the Works Committee report which discusses the impact of the trial locations throughout the City of Toronto as a whole.

Numerous Councillors and staff have expressed skepticism about the effectiveness of Community Safety Zones, especially if they are not complemented by noticeable police enforcement. Because the resources of the Toronto Police Service are limited in this regard, staff cautioned Council about diluting the impact of Community Safety Zones by approving too many.

Applying the Criteria to Fairfax Crescent

With respect to applying the criteria for Community Safety Zones to Fairfax Crescent, the speed profile on Fairfax Crescent is typical for a local road with a 40 km/h posted speed limit. 85th percentile speeds were approximately 50 km/h before the pinch points were installed, and this value dropped to about 44 km/h afterwards, as currently observed. Furthermore, prior to the installation of the "pinch points" there were several collisions where motorists failed to safely negotiate the curves on Fairfax Crescent. Since the installation of three "pinch points" in the summer of 1997, there have been no collisions of a similar nature. One of the key criteria for a Community Safety Zone is as follows:

"other mitigating measures are inappropriate or have not been effective."

Because there is ongoing discussion with respect to the use of traffic calming devices on Fairfax Crescent, which would be considered mitigating measures, it seems premature to consider a Community Safety Zone for this street. Furthermore, locations which are considered the highest potential safety risk are elementary school areas. The school on Fairfax Crescent is the W.A. Porter Collegiate Institute.

Therefore, staff are of the opinion that Fairfax Crescent does not meet the criteria for the application of a Community Safety Zone at this time.

Conclusions:

Because there are other mitigating measures which are being considered to maintain a low collision frequency on Fairfax Crescent, and because an elementary school is not located on the street, staff do not recommend the installation of a Community Safety Zone on Fairfax Crescent.

Contact Name:

Peter K. Hillier

Manager, Traffic Operations, District 4

Telephone: 396-7148

Gary H. Welsh

Director

Transportation Services

Works and Emergency Services

District 4

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