Letters to the Editor: August 24, 2024

Article content

Consequences the key

Whatever you name them, they’re a Band-Aid on a huge wound. The issue is vehicular traffic not driving at reasonable speeds through neighbourhoods despite reduced speed limits and signage.

The downside of traffic calming measures is environmental. A fossil-fuel-powered vehicle is at it’s most efficient, and least polluting, when operating at a moderate, steady speed. The following conditions increase emissions and fuel consumption dramatically: cold running, idling, acceleration and deceleration. Those conditions also negatively impact the battery life of electric powered vehicles.

Article content

I drive a modest-sized car, so I have to slow dramatically for speed bumps to avoid damage to my vehicle. Large SUVs and trucks seem unfazed by the bumps, so their effectiveness in reducing speeds is limited for those vehicles.

The only effective traffic calming measure is narrower streets. Enforcement of speed limits is also an effective deterrent. I can’t remember the last time I saw a police officer with radar enforcing speed limits. People speed with impunity. Photo radar generates income and has been effective in slowing traffic around schools in London. It’s a much better alternative to speed cushions.

Better traffic light co-ordination would move traffic back onto major routes and off neighbourhood roads.

I get the impression our city planners and politicians were trying to force everyone out of their cars and onto bikes or public transit. If that’s the ploy, it isn’t going to work for me.

I’m pushing 80 and while I can ride a bicycle and own one, there is no way I’m going to risk my life on a major road, bike lanes or no bike lanes.

The goal here should be to alter driver behaviour. Traffic calming causes driver anger and that unleashes more bad behaviour. There needs to be better enforcement of speed limits. No consequence, no change.

Article content

R. Cameron, London

Sites not safe

Recall the opposition to the establishment of the safe injection site on York Street.

Now, walk or drive by that site, opposite the Men’s Mission building, and see a litter field of crumpled people, trash and carts.

It is appalling and proof these places only attract more vulnerable people, often people in crisis.

Regardless of their distance from schools or daycares or homes or apartments or retail stores, this program guarantees human distress and the remnants of life in a shopping cart. And as usual, there is no effort by city or the site operators to return the premises to the intended safe place.

RJ Webb, London

Get rid of board

Regarding the article LHSC chops $2.3M in salaries, plans to cut half top brass (Aug. 21).

What is the severance costs to the organization for these terminations, including that of former CEO Jackie Scheilfer Taylor?

Where is the board of directors is all of this? Are they simply rubber stamping whatever is presented to them? Perhaps the replacement of the entire board of directors is in order.

Article content

We certainly do not hear any such issues of St. Joseph’s Health Care. Why?

Keith Lawson, London

Bike lanes save lives

The people who complain about bike lane construction need to be reminded of two things.

First, Driving a car in Ontario is a privilege and not a right. The gasoline tax has no bearing on this fact. Cars have no more right on the streets than do the bikes.

Second, the Ontario Driver’s Handbook specifies that bikes are permitted within one metre of the curb.

Bike lanes have become common in response to bad driving. Drivers are breaking speed limits with impunity. As well, many drivers cannot drive a straight line. I suspect environmental concerns are secondary. The real reason cities are building bike lanes is to prevent death and injury of cyclists.

David Nielsen, London

Limit union power

There was a time when unions were a necessity due to unsafe working conditions, poor benefits and low wages. Today, however, unions and in particular government unions, have gotten completely out of control.

Wages and benefits are never good enough, according to the unions, despite the fact that wages and benefits in the public sector are much better than their private sector counterparts.

Article content

It’s time for governments to declare the public sector, as well as other vital services, to be essential services. Those contracts should be settled by arbitration. CN is a classic example of what should be deemed essential after the lockout that threatened the entire Canadian economy.

It’s time to put an end to greedy union demands. It’s time to stop holding employers and the public hostage. It’s time for the dog to wag the tail.

Steve Matthews, London

Article content