Speed limits reduced at 9 Vancouver elementary schools Monday

As part of a bigger plan to eliminate traffic-related deaths and injuries, the City of Vancouver is lowering speed limits around a handful of schools across the city effective Monday.

The city says the locations were chosen based on the technical analysis of speeds.

“This is because crashes can happen for a variety of reasons that do not necessarily have speed as a contributing factor. For example, distracted driving, poor visibility, drunk driving, etc. Some of these common causes for collisions are very difficult or even impossible to measure,” says the city in a statement to CityNews Vancouver.

The rules around how fast you can go will be in place from 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. on school days.

“To alert drivers to the new speed limits, we will be installing regulatory signs and localized signage at the schools. Community Policing Centre volunteers will also be at some locations to provide support through the Speed Watch program to raise awareness among drivers of their speeds in real-time,” adds the city.

Speed limits will drop from 50 km/h to 40 km/h around:

• Dr. Annie B Jamieson – 6350 Tisdall St. near W 49th Ave.
• John Norquay – 4710 Slocan St. near Kingsway
• Florence Nightingale – 2740 Guelph St. near E 12th Ave.
• Dr. George M Weir – 2900 E 44th Ave. near Rupert St.
• Stratford Hall – 3000 Commercial Dr. near E 12th Ave.
• Henry Hudson – 1551 Cypress St. near Cornwall Ave.
• šxʷwəq̓ʷəθət (Crosstown) – 55 Expo Blvd. near Abbott St.

Speed limits will drop from 50 km/h to 30 km/h around:

• Sir Wilfrid Laurier – 7350 Laurel St. near W 57th Ave.
• Waverly – 6111 Elliott St. near E 47th Ave.

Michael Lang, with the Vancouver School District Parent Advisory Council’s Active Travel and Safe Routes group, says concerns around safety for children are front and centre for his group and likely many other DPACs around the region.

“Even the Vancouver School Board hears from parents [about] traffic issues so it’s something parents, families, school communities talk about a lot, so we know it’s important. One of the first things that come up from parents on PACs is they’re scared for their children or themselves and they’re worried about things like the speed of cars,” Lang said. “It’s often that people don’t respect the speed limit around schools. It’s treated more as a speed minimum, rather than a speed maximum.”

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He says at the beginning of every school year there is police enforcement but then it drops off as the school year gets underway and people go back to speeding.

“Parents and families want to see solutions to making sure people follow these speed limits,” adds Lang who wants to see automated speed checks put in place. “People have talked about things like the Slow Street Program.

There are those banana barriers, those are popular in school communities, people really do want to see infrastructure change that forces people to slow down and protects children who are walking and biking to school.”

Despite wanting this initiative put in place all year round, he’s not sure how viable it would be, adding it’s on the city to make it a reality.

“Removing the politics from it. I think it would be, for a lot of parents, very popular. People do want to see this. I think what we need to here is centre our students and the school community in this and how it benefits them.”

The initiative is a pilot project that city staff will monitor, gather data and public feedback, and report back to council next year.

–With files from James Paracy