By Pepper Parr
November 30th, 2019
BURLINGTON, ON
In a memo to the Planning & Development Committee ward 3 Councillor Rory Nisan advises his colleagues that “ In many respects Kilbride Street is unique in Burlington. Located in the center of a village, it has a fire department, elementary school and park within a small stretch of road, with sidewalks on one side in some areas and no sidewalks at others, while also being a through point for traffic moving east-west through North Burlington.
Rory Nisan with a voter during the 2018 election.
“Kilbride residents enjoy walking along Kilbride Street and have raised concerns regarding speeding in the area” said Nisan in his memo. Many of his constituents have been very vocal.
Nisan had promised the people of Kilbride that he would get the speed limits reduced – so far he hasn’t been able to deliver on that promise.
Councillor Nisan has not been able to convince Transportation staff to reduce the speed limits;his hope is that staff might consider a community safety zone. If put in place a safety zone could be an effective tool to prevent speeding by doubling speed fines, acting as an immediate deterrent.
Nisan points out that automated speed enforcement may be applied in 2020 but will only be allowed in community safety zones. He advises that he “will be bringing the following staff direction to the December 3, 2019 Planning & Development Committee meeting:
Director of Transportation Vito Tolone.
Direct the Director of Transportation to conduct an expedited review of Kilbride Street to determine whether a community safety zone is warranted and provide a report including the review’s methodology, findings and a recommendation to committee by January 2020.
The Director of Transportation and the Councillor need to get out and talk this through. Vito Tolone knows transportation and is known to have co-operated in the past. There is a solution here. Might take some listening on the part of the Councillor.
Not surprising. Transportation is the most uncooperative, intractable and unresponsive department at City Hall. I’m still getting over the Ward 5 Town Hall meeting I attended in 2017 hosted by Councillor Sharman when a ratepayer got up and presented a petition with over a hundred names on it asking the City to refrain from putting in yet another speed bump on his street. The poor man was just blown away and dismissed as a nuisance.
Community engagement starts with those heading City Departments who not only “talk the talk” but “walk the talk”. And if they can’t follow the agenda then it’s time they were replaced, post haste!
The people of Kilbride want this. Their councillor is trying to get it for them. Staff needs to take direction from the council and get it done!