Saanich council is exploring ways to accelerate the district’s 30-year active transportation plan on the heels of a second pedestrian struck by a motorist, one fatally, in just over a month on Saanich roads.
Councillors voted unanimously Monday night to ask staff to report back on options to cut the timeline in half to 15 years and work toward Vision Zero, a strategy first implemented in Sweden and adopted in countries across Europe to eliminate traffic fatalities and severe injuries.
Coun. Rebecca Mersereau, who put forward the motion with councillors Zac de Vries and Ned Taylor, said the vote is a sign that council is united in wanting to improve protection for vulnerable road users.
“It’s the start of a discussion about how do we make these things higher priorities in Saanich, and really they’ve only been a priority in Saanich for a handful of years,” she said.
Saanich's active transportation plan was adopted in 2018, and while it’s an “impressive document,” Mersereau said the 30-year timeline is “far too long to benefit current residents.”
A staff report exploring how the district can achieve Vision Zero is expected next month, while the second report is more likely to come in the spring, Mersereau said.
Around the same time that councillors were discussing the motion, a 60-year-old man was struck in a hit-and-run while crossing Burnside Road West and taken to hospital for non-life-threatening injuries. That comes just over a month after 16-year-old Kaydence Bourque was killed in a marked and lighted crosswalk on Cedar Hill Cross Road while walking home from work.
De Vries said Saanich council has heard “loud and clear” from residents that they want to see the plan implemented more quickly.
“If council goes down this road of accelerating our active transportation plan and developing a Vision Zero strategy, we will fundamentally change the way that residents live. It’s going to increase the livability of our communities. It’s going to help us achieve our climate targets,” he said.
The vote is a step in the right direction, but it’s just a first step, Taylor said.
“It is important to recognize that we’re not there yet, and there’s still a lot more work to do. And there’s a lot more decisions that council is going to have to make down the road,” he said.
One of the next big decisions facing council is the 2022 budget, which has yet to be finalized, he said.
Council will need to allocate increased spending on the district’s pedestrian and cycling network if it wants accelerate the transition to active transportation, Taylor said. “Otherwise, we’re really just virtue signalling.”
He encouraged residents who have been advocating for these investments to keep pressure on council.
Saanich resident Elise Cote, a member of Better Mobility Saanich who co-wrote a letter urging councillors to commit to Vision Zero and accelerate the active transportation plan, said she’s heartened by the unanimous support for exploring both.
“I do see a shift and I think it needs to go further. I think the public is ready to push for that,” Cote said.
In Victoria, police continue to investigate a Dec. 30 hit-and-run caught on video, which showed a driver striking a young woman and running a red light. Police seized a vehicle closely resembling the car involved, but no arrests have been made or charges laid, Const. Cam MacIntyre said Tuesday.
