Speed Camera Politics In Ontario Will Cost Lives
Ontario Premier Doug Ford has threatened to remove all speed cameras in Ontario. Despite opposition from numerous municipalities and safety organizations Ford has refused to change his mind calling the cameras a “cash grab”. However no one has explained the details about why this criticism might apply. Official news reporting agencies could have explained those details but they have not.
Who is the private vendor who operates the cameras? How much does the private vendor earn from this ticketing activity? How much do municipalities earn from this ticketing action? Is there a conflict of interest in purposely lowering the speed threshold so that more ticketing money can be generated? How many drivers were ticketed for going, say, 5 km/h above the posted speed limit? The answers to many such questions would clarify whether the speed cameras were being used to generate income rather than to improve traffic safety.
If Premier Ford was genuinely interested in improving traffic safety he could have required that speed camera operations be adjusted to a higher threshold and this has been called for by many organizations responding to Ford’s illogical threats. A higher threshold would mean that only the truly dangerous drivers would be apprehended rather than a large portion of the travelling public who are not a major safety threat travelling just over the speed limit. From the viewpoint of someone who has studied collision causation for over 40 years, it is of less importance to reduce the average travelling speed of the entire population of drivers at a site. Rather what is more important is to apprehend that small segment drivers who are travelling at very high and dangerous speeds. From the experience of Gorski Consulting it is this small segment of dangerous drivers who cause a much higher percentage of the safety problems and only speed cameras can detect them efficiently. The cost of sending a police speed enforcement unit to catch such select dangerous drivers is prohibitive and current police forces are not geared to increasing their speed patrols when so many other emergencies take up their time.
The removal of speed cameras is a dangerous act which will give many dangerous drivers a “wild west”, open road, to speed without much consequence. It is the combination of municipal lack of accountability for speed camera operations along with Premier Ford’s illogical reasoning that will cause this dangerous situation to develop.
What Is More Important – Observing Cyclists, E-Scooters, Or Both?
Road safety is becoming more complicated. As we transition from roadways travelled by large, fossil-fueled, motor vehicles to battery-powered e-bikes and e-scooters many road jurisdictions are falling behind addressing these new developments.
In the past few years Gorski Consulting has focused attention on gathering observations of cyclists in the vicinity of London, Ontario in the belief that cyclist injuries and deaths are likely to become an increasingly important issue. Only a few years ago the traditional pedal-cycle was the predominant, two-wheel vehicle travelling on, and adjacent, to roadways in London. Even current guidelines contained in recent manuals of the Ontario Traffic Manual assume the predominant existence of pedal-cycles with no mention of e-bikes or e-scooters. Yet the transportation landscape has changed dramatically in the last few years. If someone were to make detailed observations of traffic one would recognize this change.
While Gorski Consulting has observed the large increase in e-bikes, our focus has not been on a similarly large increase in the numbers of e-scooters. It is becoming apparent that such a lack of focus is causing an increasingly dangerous condition to fall under the radar.
The above photo shows some of the concerns with e-scooter safety. While e-scooters are being ridden on urban sidewalks they provide a measure of safety to the riders in areas where high traffic volumes and minimal infrastructure exists to protect riders. However e-scooters are also being ridden at faster speeds than typical pedal-cycles and in many cases the governors that keep their speed within a legal limit are being disabled. And much like many pedal-cyclists, riders of e-scooters fail to wear helmets. Fast moving e-bikes and e-scooters are also now causing greater safety problems to users of sidewalks; a fact that has not become significant until very recently.
Furthermore the smaller wheels of e-scooters, such as the one shown in the photo above, create the potential of loss of control when the surface being ridden contains an irregularity. What many riders do not understand is that the diameter of a wheel influences whether a disturbance in the cycle/scooter will occur. The larger the diameter of a wheel the less likely that the wheel will “fall into” a crevice or will be disturbed by a vertical change in the surface. This is commonly understood when the large wheels of heavy trucks can easily ride over top of a roadway curb whereas the wheel of a smaller passenger car would experience a difficulty. The same applies to the wheels of cycles. But more importantly many e-scooters contain wheels with very small diameters and this becomes an added safety problem when the riders also do not wear helmets. Riders might as well be children if they are not told how they could be injured or killed.
While battery-powered, two-wheeled vehicles are increasingly seen on all roadways there continues to be no safety information provided by all levels of government, police, and medical professions to inform the public of the dangers riders could experience wherever they may ride.
Yes You Have Your Freedom – But Choose It Carefully
A number of years ago I had the unpleasant experience of attending a collision site and meeting with lawyers and a collision victim who sustained quadriplegia after she was struck while riding her bicycle. She was destined to spend the rest of her life pushing buttons on an advanced wheelchair. She was one of the most beautiful young women I had ever met. And because it was early after her tragedy her beauty was still easy to see. Before the collision she had her life fully ahead of her. Afterwards she had to come to a very dark and difficult reality.
Tragedies like these are what you make of them. And even though this was extremely difficult she eventually managed to take on her challenge and deal with it as best she could. She moved on. Terry Fox had to deal with the same with the same courage.
But there are moments in life where we have an opportunity to change what circumstances lie ahead. If we think clearly, we can understand that certain decisions can be made to prevent irreversible incidents that change our lives forever. That is the scenario of the irreversible consequence of a collision.
The photo above was taken a few days before the writing of this short article. What it shows is a young woman stopped at a busy intersection in east London Ontario and she is preparing to cross the road when the traffic signal turns green for her. She has outfitted herself with things like a water bottle and a reflector on her bike. And she has a bicycle helmet – but the helmet is not on her head – it is hanging from the handlebar of her bike.
Well this is not all that dangerous, one might say, because she is stopped. But the quadriplegic young female was also at a similar London intersection before she was struck, and struck again by a second vehicle, resulting in her painful and irreversible consequences. What would one do as a parent, or close relation, to recognize this scenario and change its outcome? But there are many of us in positions of influence where we could step in when we see something that could result in something terribly wrong. We are police, we educators, we are politicians and we are close relatives of those who make poor decisions without recognizing the eternity of those mistakes. Why are we not prepared to educate those in danger before they make a mistake because they are uniformed?
Why Was Fatal E-Scooter Rider Described as a Pedestrian?
The problem with the reliability and validity of official collision records is exemplified again in the fatal collision of an e-scooter rider in north-east London Ontario on Wednesday, September 17, 2025. For the first day of reports the local CTV News agency was reporting that a “pedestrian” was hit on Beckworth Ave. And since the roadway was closed no one could get close enough to confirm the reports that likely came from the investigating London City Police.
Next, on September 18th CTV News reported that a “scooter” driver died at that location. But the word “scooter” conjures up different meanings. Was this a push scooter without an electric engine? Because of the limited speed at which a push scooter can be operated it can be operated very differently on London’s roads. And the concerns of health officials and road safety experts would not be triggered by the growing trends of e-scooter driver injuries and deaths.
Then on September 18th CTV News posted a new article entitled “E-scooter safety under spotlight after operator dies in London crash”. Investigating police reportedly clarified that this scooter was “…the one that you stand on…”. So this description of the involved scooter is much different than the initial description which stated that a pedestrian was struck. But is that important?
In our detailed observations of cyclists in London Gorski Consulting has also observed many e-scooters. Informally we have observed on many occasions that e-scooters are being operated at a much higher speed that the maximum 24 km/h permitted by the Ontario Highway Traffic Act. This is also a trend with some e-bikes which are observed travelling much faster than a typical pedal-bike.
Historically those cycle riders who could attain average speeds above 20 to 25 km/h were those riders who were experienced and knowledgeable. They could be seen with superior equipment and they invested in safety equipment such as bright clothing, helmets and proper lighting. And because of their higher speeds they also tended to travel on roads designed for motor vehicle traffic or on designated cycling paths or tracks. So it would be rare that such riders would be seen riding “very quickly” on a sidewalk for example. But exceptions always exist.
What is happening now though is that inexperienced riders, and ones who do not understand the importance of safe riding, are getting on e-scooters and e-bikes and they are attaining substantially faster speeds than those riding on higher-end pedal cycles. What is more is that many of these e-riders are riding on sidewalks at much higher speeds than pedal-bikers. While there were safety benefits for some riders of pedal-bikes to ride on sidewalks on dangerous roadways the situation is changing for the worse where this safety benefit is being negated. Riding an e-device at high speed on a sidewalk, or anywhere with motor vehicle traffic, is creating a new safety problem that is not being captured in official collision statistics.
A research paper “Characteristics of outdoor motorized scooter-related injuries” by Sofiia Desiateryk, Sarah Zutrauen et. al. reported on Canadian hospital data from 2012 to 2017 and concerns were expressed that scooter injury rates were increasing. In July, 2025 the Canadian Automobile Association (CAA) also publicized a report that they commissioned to look at safety issues surrounding e-bikes and e-scooters. The CAA report included the finding that “…Official collision data is inconsistent and often lacks key details, including recording whether an e-bike or e-scooter was involved”.
The poor reporting of the current collision in London high-lights the need to recognize that better, public reporting in crucial to address any road safety developments.
Far Too Much Biased Politics But Sometimes A Stand Must Be Made
At Gorski Consulting we try, as much as possible, to stay away from biased politics and focus on preventing needless injury and death from transportation incidents. However if you stand for nothing you fail as a human being. Thus we post this photo of the scars of a black man that many in the U.S. want to have removed from public viewing in the current Trumpist regime. Those scars represent not only the man you see. They represent the suffering of all man (woman)kind who deserve a better life no matter what race, religion, sex, age or whatever. We all deserve a life of peace, freedom and respect.
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