September 2025
Re: “Lawlessness going unchecked in Canada’s biggest city” (Jerry Agar, Toronto Sun, 9 September): I usually agree with Jerry Agar, but on this one I disagree with his assertion that the infamous Parkside Drive camera, which was cut down for the 7th time in 10 months recently, or any speed camera, isn’t a cash grab. My reason for believing this is quite simple: the Parkside camera, alone, has issued $8 million in fines.
If the goal is getting people to slow down, there are easier and less expensive options. One would be for cities is to buy one or two cameras, depending on the size of the city, along with a huge stack of “Municipal Speed Enforcement” signs to place around the city. The camera could be placed at random spots around the city, perhaps with an assortment of fake cameras, so drivers never know which are the real speed camera zones and which aren’t. Just like when you see a police car parked at the side of the road, whenever I see a sign warning of a speed camera, I immediately slow down. Isn’t that the goal?
Another option is installing speed bumps on targeted roadways. There are valid concerns that they might impede emergency services vehicles getting to a location quickly, but that would depend on the frequency of their placement on roadways. Speed bumps might be more suitable for locations like school zones.
Oh sure, if you don’t want a ticket, don’t speed. I get that, but the reality is that unless you have the cruise control on, your speed can very easily fluctuate without you intending to go over the speed limit. Municipalities could also synchronize traffic lights better, hopefully eliminating the need to speed to avoid getting stopped at the fourth stop light in a row, and have realistic speeds on roadways.
I’m not claiming that this is the perfect solution, but if photo radar is really about safety and not a money-printing machine, then prove it to me.
For the record, I don’t support damaging any speed enforcement equipment, although it is humourous that the Parkside Drive has been cut down 7 times. Are we taking bets on when number 8 gets cut down, or if the camera will even get replaced this time?
*******************************************************************************************************************
The original column that inspired my column:
AGAR: Lawlessness going unchecked in Canada’s biggest city | Toronto Sun
When is enough, enough?
The speed camera was installed after a speeder killed an elderly couple in a five-vehicle crash.
The camera has issued $8 million in fines from that one camera.
It is, by all measure, a money-making enterprise.
But not a money grab.
Don’t want to pay — don’t speed.
But the issue is that the camera having been taken down by vandals seven times is a lack of adequate law enforcement, and a lack of design such that it is not so easy to destroy.
The people destroying it are dangerous people as they think their self-declared right to speed is more important than public safety.
That is the sort of person who will violate you if a circumstance should arise where his self-regard is injured in his mind by whatever he perceives you did or said.
Lawlessness at all levels goes unchecked too often in this city.
Disorder is rampant.
We see on the public transit system.
We see it with antisemitic protests in Jewish neighborhoods, at businesses and with hateful people parading masked in our streets.
Violent criminals are arrested — in examples of the police doing their job — but the bad guys are sent back out onto the streets in time for dinner and a crime.
If you are tempted to say I am overplaying it, remember that the Toronto Sun’s Michele Mandel told us the story of a man arrested and released three times in one weekend.
To have a camera destroyed once is another incident of public mischief in the city.
A second time is a pattern, but by a seventh time is a law enforcement fail and an obvious message to anti-social hammer heads that they can do what they want in Toronto, as they do when blatantly robbing the LCBO with impunity.
We are at the point now that the only people who can’t do what they want are the majority who as law abiding people follow the law even if they don’t like it.
I don’t like some of the speed limits.
I slow down and deal with it.
So do most people.
What I am talking about is known as the broken windows theory.
When the police round up the people who break windows, jump the cue at the subway system, and generally go after the seemingly small stuff, they inevitably end up arresting people wanted for bigger things.
None of us wants to live in a police state, but we do want to live in a city — in a society — that honours law and order and allows people to go peacefully about their lives on a daily basis.
If the same crime keeps happening at the same location time and time again, and the police can’t or won’t stop it, public perception can easily be that law enforcement is not a priority in Toronto.
It emboldens the wrong type of people.
The National Post ran a story entitled, “How some Canadian cities are becoming more lawless than the U.S.”
“Property crime is now higher in select Canadian cities than in any U.S. equivalent.”
The murder rate is still higher in the U.S., but if we don’t start caring about crime, we may catch up.
Read More
