Focusing traffic safety enforcement on the Malahat mountain highway appears to have shown the effectiveness of more police on the street, but subsequent discussion sounds like a Band-aid approach.
Few dangerous drivers live on the Malahat – they come from elsewhere, probably driving dangerously where they live.
A comprehensive approach is necessary to change the tone of the street everywhere. That will take much effort initially to overcome the effect of years of poor education and neglect of policing.
But will voters develop and support politicians with the decency and guts to curb those who deliberately endanger other people? Voters have instead been electing politicians like those of Esquimalt, who spend money on cutesy medians that only serve to hide jaywalkers instead of on policing. And bureaucrats become constipated about driving tests when the problem is attitude, which can’t be evaluated adequately in a test – notice the number of bad drivers with ‘N’ magnets on the back? Bureaucrats can’t even erect clear signage in the right places.
I ask everyone fussing about safety on the Malahat if they are working to re-orient current politicians and help develop better ones.
Keith Sketchley
Saanich
