Wednesday, July 1, 2009

Cyclists, drivers hit in police crackdown

John Rieti Staff Reporter - The Star

Toronto police stuck cyclists and drivers with 5,907 tickets during its latest one-week campaign to get the two groups to share Toronto's streets.

Cyclists were ticketed 1,373 times for disobeying traffic signals and failing to yield to pedestrians. Equipment — or the lack thereof — got bike riders in trouble, too, as 747 tickets were issued to those who rode without the mandatory bell, light and reflectors.

Eighty-four tickets were handed out to people not wearing helmets.
Drivers were ticketed 3,502 times for opening car doors without looking for cyclists and for not yielding to cyclists. Police also left 198 tickets on cars parked in bike lanes.

A further 852 drivers and cyclists were handed warnings about a variety of offences such as cyclists dangerously passing cars on the right next to driveways and drivers failing to check over their shoulders for cyclists.

"This campaign wasn't meant to target bicycles, or bicycle-related offences ... we're targetting road offences," said Sgt. Tim Burrows. "We're trying to make it safer out there."

The "Safe Cycling - Share the Responsibility" campaign ran from June 22-28. During the same campaign last year Toronto police issued 6,671 tickets.

http://www.thestar.com/news/gta/article/658969

No comments:

Post a Comment