City of Ottawa staff are defending the graphic nature of a new online advertisement aimed at discouraging jaywalking on city streets, saying it is part of a campaign focusing on behaviours will "depict the serious nature of road safety and lead to greater awareness to all road users of their responsibilities."

“We continually flame road violence as an outcome of personal choices yet we all know very well it’s the result of our cities choices,” Tom Flood said on X, the platform formerly known as Twitter.

“This is an unacceptable ad; victim blaming road violence is not the city I believe in,” architect Toon Dreessen said.

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Statistics provided by Gonthier shows 25 per cent of all fatal and major injury collisions on Ottawa’s roads involve pedestrians. The memo provided data on collisions between 2017 and 2021 on Ottawa roads:

  • 29 per cent of fatal and major injury collisions involving a pedestrian occurred when a pedestrian was crossing a road midblock (away from an intersection)
  • 23 per cent of fatal and major injury collisions involving a pedestrian occurred when a pedestrian with the right-of-way was struck at an intersection by a left turning driver
  • 11 per cent of fatal and major injury collisions involving a pedestrian occurred when a pedestrian who did not have the right-of-way was struck by a vehicle travelling straight through an intersection
  • @[email protected]
    18•1 year ago

    29 per cent of fatal and major injury collisions involving a pedestrian occurred when a pedestrian was crossing a road midblock (away from an intersection)

    So 71% don’t involve jaywalking at all? Funny how they left that out.

    • PedestrianError :vbus: :nblvt:
      5•1 year ago

      @Rodeo @BedSharkPal Crossing away from an intersection is only illegal (or in anti-pedestrian slang, “jaywalking”) if it’s between two adjacent signalized intersections. Crossing against a “don’t walk” signal could also be considered “jaywalking”… but police reports are notoriously inaccurate and windshield biased anyway so take everything with a grain of salt. Most dangerous crossings happen due to bad traffic engineering, regardless of legality.

      • @[email protected]English
        1•1 year ago

        Crossing against the signal at a controlled intersection can get you a fine, and sometimes PDs to blitzes at certain intersections.

    • Frances Larina
      1•1 year ago

      @Rodeo @BedSharkPal

      That may be somewhat biased if most people don’t jaywalk and instead concentrate at intersections. California just made jaywalking legal, so we’ll find out in a few years I suppose.

    • @[email protected]
      -3•1 year ago

      Isn’t that just basic math? How is that funny?

      Edit: ah, nvm. I didn’t realize this thread was just a circlejerk. Carry on.