A pickup driver taking a corner on St-Hubert Street mowed down a pedestrian Saturday. The woman is in critical condition.
Update: the woman in that accident has died, but another woman was mowed down by an SUV driver later Saturday in Villeray. I am sorry to have to inaugurate the 2020 count.
A teenager at the wheel of an SUV mowed down a pedestrian during a street race Friday in Montreal North. He’ll be charged with dangerous driving.
Infuriating. Thankfully the pedestrian is ok.
How do you conclude he is ok? The article only says “his injuries are not life-threatening”. He could still be paralyzed, blinded, or any other godawful thing.
That “injuries are not life-threatening” phrase the media always uses infuriates me, it downplays the severity of the incident.
A hundred-year-old building had a bad fire Friday afternoon down Lucien-L’Allier. It had been standing empty. Historian Robert Wilkins wrote about the building for his blog in 2014.
Update: Arson is suspected.
Oh, I’ve walked by that building too many times to count. I’ve sort of idly wondered what it had been, but never enough to try and dig around online. It’s such a very central location, that it would be great to see it used for something. (Typhoid Condos? They might need to pick a different name…) That walk to the metro is kind of lonely, too, so it would be nice to see more life around there.
Aw crap. I walk by that building almost every day on my way to the LL Metro. It had been gutted recently and a lot of scaffolding put up to hold up the facade. The sidewalk had a “cave” of scaffolding to get past the building, which was a bit of a pain in the butt as that street has been under non-stop construction for a year or more, so walking down there was a ever-changing obstacle course. I guess it will be worse now, at least in the short term.
When I was at Concordia in the early 90s (fine arts) I’d walk by that building a few times a week. At the time it was being used as one of the sets for the Radio-Canada TV series “Scoop.”
There’s quite a large space behind that building. There’s been some guys living in tarp structures there since this summer. Before the construction started, one structure was against the back of the building. Then they moved to the back corner behind where the gas station was (condos going in there as well). I don’t imagine they’ll be able to stay there much longer.
That blog piece is great, thanks for the link.
The Gazette’s Allison Hanes talks to people who live in an urban discontinuity in St-Laurent.
It’s on StreetView, if anyone wants a virtual visit.
Tim S. 22:46 on 2020-01-04 Permalink
According to police, it was a “low-speed impact.” But of course, the mass and design of a vehicle also has an effect on the injuries sustained (controlling for age and speed, ‘light trucks’ cause three times as many severe injuries and twice as many deaths, according to one study (https://injuryprevention.bmj.com/content/10/3/154)). It would be helpful if our laws took into account the mass and design of the vehicle as well as the speed. After all, seeing as there’s so much consumer choice in vehicles, people should be held accountable for their decisions to buy and drive dangerous vehicles.
Spi 10:37 on 2020-01-05 Permalink
I always thought that the safety certification process took into consideration pedestrian safety during a collision, so that in case of a collision they would go over and land on the relatively soft hood of a car instead of on the ground and under. Looking at how tall and square some SUV and pickups have become it seems inevitable that if you’re hit by one of those you’re going to the ground and under the wheels.
Jack 11:44 on 2020-01-05 Permalink
https://www.theguardian.com/cities/2019/oct/07/a-deadly-problem-should-we-ban-suvs-from-our-cities
That has to be answered by citizens, our political class cannot.
jeather 12:20 on 2020-01-05 Permalink
I am not sure what the Canadian laws are, but it’s known that EU laws prioritise safety of pedestrians in collisions and US laws prioritise safety of passengers.
mare 14:21 on 2020-01-05 Permalink
Part of the driving test should be the experience of mowing down a pedestrian or cyclist (a doll or trained stuntman) at very low speed with bad lighting.
Not to teach you to do that, but to make aspiring drivers experience how awful that is. It might stick, and might make drivers more aware how careful they should be when they’re navigating a 3000 kg potential murder weapon through streets populated with road users who are much more fragile.
(Even better would be if they put every candidate in a kind of thrill ride with streets, crossroads, sidewalks, etc. as a pedestrian and lots of foam cars are knocking them over because they’re not vigilant enough. Make them experience traffic from another perspective.)
DeWolf 14:28 on 2020-01-05 Permalink
I was at Beaubien and St-Hubert yesterday evening when a driver angrily overtook another car that had stopped to park. Not only did he veer into oncoming traffic, the driver nearly hit a man who was in the middle of crossing the street.
The St-Hubert renos are looking good but they really need to be accompanied by improvements on all of the cross-streets, which have lots of pedestrian traffic but narrow sidewalks and a lack of places to cross safely.