To the editor:
Re: "Lowering speed limit won't stop jaywalkers," July 26.
Despite what Police Chief Jim Chu claims, speed is always a factor in pedestrian-involved collisions. The research unanimously concludes that the speed of a vehicle largely determines whether the pedestrian will be bruised, maimed or killed. According to one study, pedestrians hit by vehicles travelling 48 km/h die at a rate of 45 per cent. At 32 km/h, that number plummets to just five per cent. If anything, the fact that vehicles on Hastings generally travel below the old arbitrary 50 km/h limit suggests that traffic won't be significantly disrupted by the new 30 km/h limit since the reduction needed to improve pedestrian safety isn't that great.
It's hard to imagine the cost of enforcing the new limit on a short stretch of Hastings will be as high as the chief implies, considering there are already more cops in the area than elsewhere in the city, who in the past have had seemingly unlimited resources for useless campaigns like ticketing the people least able to pay fines for things like spitting on the sidewalk or peeing in the alley.
Lani Russwurm, Vancouver
