Better sorry than safe? Amber-light times and speed-limit signs that failed to meet Canadian standards deliver clear evidence that Winnipeg’s photo-enforcement system was set up for profit rather than protection, critics charge By: Ryan Thorpe Posted: 7:00 PM CST Friday, Feb. 25, 2022

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This article was published 24/02/2022 (1034 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

If a car is going faster than a car going slower, does the car going faster need more time to stop than the car going slower?

For years, that was the question independent researcher Christian Sweryda would ask the class when he was invited to guest lecture at universities in Winnipeg on traffic issues.

Then he would tell everyone who thought the faster car needed more time to stop to raise their hand.

“The whole class would put their hands up, thinking: ‘What’s the catch?’” Sweryda says.

“And I’d say: ‘You guys are now more qualified to do traffic engineering than the City of Winnipeg’s own engineers, because this is what we’re fighting over.’”

The city’s longstanding policy was to have uniform yellow light times — four seconds long — at every intersection, regardless of speed limit. Sweryda waged a battle against the city for more than a decade in an effort to get it changed.

His research into traffic-related issues, which has uncovered evidence of financial mismanagement in the public works department and triggered an audit, is the subject of the Free Press investigative series Red Light, Green Light, No Oversight.

•••

On Oct. 16, 2015, when James Aisaican-Chase was on his way to a chemotherapy appointment, he approached the intersection of Bishop Grandin Boulevard and River Road and the green light turned to yellow.

Instead of slamming on his brakes in a panic stop, Aisaican-Chase maintained a steady speed and sailed through the intersection, clearing it in 4.3 seconds — roughly one-third of a second longer than the four seconds allotted.

The speed limit on Bishop Grandin is 80 kilometres per hour. When Aisaican-Chase received a red-light camera ticket in the mail, he decided to fight it, believing his decision to clear the intersection was the safest thing to do in the moment.

The decision to fight the ticket led to a complicated and protracted court battle, which was bankrolled by Todd Dube, founder of Wise Up Winnipeg. Over the years, Dube spent more than $100,000 of his own money fighting the city’s yellow-light policy.

When the case went to court, Grant Lindgren, a Winnipeg Police Service crash reconstructionist, was called to testify as an expert witness for the Crown.

On the stand, Lindgren conceded the city wasn’t following Institute of Traffic Engineering standards and said he wasn’t aware of any other jurisdiction that runs its yellow lights the way Winnipeg does.

“Maybe they could reconsider their timing,” Lindgren said.

Dube hired Darryl Schnarr, a forensic engineer and accident reconstruction expert from Ontario, to write a report on the case.

“In order to evaluate the reasonableness of Mr. Aisaican-Chase’s decision to proceed through the intersection, the appropriateness of the current yellow traffic signal duration must be evaluated,” Schnarr wrote.

His report was scathing.

Schnarr noted that Winnipeg’s harsh winters negatively impact road conditions and make stopping more difficult, which means the city should be erring on the side of caution when it comes to yellow-light duration.

The yellow-light timing at Bishop Grandin Boulevard-River Road intersection was shorter than the ITE standard by 1.2 seconds.

Using photo-radar enforcement data, Schnarr calculated that if the city did follow the ITE standard, 93 per cent of the tickets at the intersection in 2015 would not have been issued. In 2016, 88 per cent would not have been issued.

“It is clear that a 4.0 second yellow traffic signal duration is appropriate for some roadways and not appropriate for others,” Schnarr wrote.

He said that four-second yellows were fine for streets with 50 km/h speed limits, but for anything beyond, the yellow-light timing should be extended.

But the city’s policy wasn’t just increasing violations at intersections, it was also impacting safety. Schnarr noted that short yellows on high-speed roads increase the risk of broadside — also referred to as T-bones, the most dangerous kind of crash — and rear-end collisions.

“(It is) clear that the 4.0 second yellow traffic signal duration does not comply with competent traffic engineering practices,” Schnarr wrote.

“Continuing to employ a 4.0 second traffic signal duration will contribute to traffic fatalities in the future, and may have contributed to traffic fatalities in the past.”

His report proved prophetic a year later.

On Sept. 4, 2018, a 61-year-old man was killed while riding his bike at the T-shaped intersection at Bishop Grandin and Lagimodiere boulevards. He was hit by a truck that failed to stop at a red light.

Eventually, Sweryda was able to convince Coun. Matt Allard, the chair of the public works committee, that the city’s yellow-light times were wrong. Allard (St. Boniface) moved a motion on Sept. 16, 2020 to fix it.

Using photo-radar enforcement data, Schnarr calculated that if the city did follow the ITE standard, 93 per cent of the tickets at the intersection in 2015 would not have been issued. In 2016, 88 per cent would not have been issued.

“It’s another one that was talked about for years.… Basically, Chris convinced me the yellow light timing was off for high-speed roads,” Allard says.

The city increased the yellow-light timing to 4.3 seconds on roads with a 70 km/h speed limit, and 4.7 seconds where it’s 80 km/h.

All told, 110 intersections were affected by the change — although the yellow-light durations are still below ITE standards.

During the next two months, photo-radar violations at Bishop Grandin and River dropped from 357 to 50 when compared to the same time period in 2019. At Lagimodiere and Grassie boulevards, the number fell to 44 from 280 the previous year.

“Winnipeg’s amber light times used to be a uniform 4.0 seconds, but we have been able to more precisely calibrate individual intersections’ timing based on national and international best practices, engineering knowledge and awareness of local context,” a city spokesman said in a statement.

“This is reflected in the Traffic Signal Timing Guidelines we use to determine duration of lights on all city streets. For further context, the Traffic Signals Branch has evolved considerably since previous full review of the timing guidelines (in 2014).”

•••

The short yellow-light duration wasn’t the only city traffic policy Sweryda believed was negatively impacting safety but benefiting photo-radar revenue.

On April 8, 2014, he filed a complaint to the Association of Professional Engineers and Geoscientists of Manitoba, targeting three city traffic engineers.

Sweryda argued the city did not post speed-reduction signs on both sides of divided roads and one-way streets, a practice “not consistent with Canadian engineering standards.”

That amounted to a “serious engineering deficiency” and “malpractice,” because motorists may “fail to see the speed reduction signs, particularly when there is a large semi-trailer truck between the motorist and speed reduction signs.”

A three-person committee was tasked with reviewing the complaint. They eventually determined that only one of the three engineers — Luis Escobar — was responsible for the policy.

During the investigation, Escobar admitted he had conducted no engineering analysis to depart from the speed-reduction signage standards detailed in the Manual of Uniform Traffic Control Devices for Canada.

Ultimately, the panel cleared him of malpractice.

“The purpose of this investigation is not to determine whether or not the policy is correct,” their decision read.

But there was one dissenting opinion from engineer Ian McKay.

“When every other major Canadian city and the Province of Manitoba are all following a particular practice, and Winnipeg is not, and the result is tickets issued to law-abiding, well-intentioned drivers, something is wrong.”
– Ted Clarke, a retired former City of Winnipeg director of streets and transportation

“Evidence on speeding ticket reductions when dual signs are posted… clearly demonstrates that there are circumstances in Winnipeg where drivers are failing to see the primary sign,” McKay wrote.

“In my view, Mr. Escobar’s actions of not completing any analysis or documenting any justification to vary from an advisory issued by Canadian Traffic Engineers constitutes professional misconduct.”

That was also the position of Ted Clarke, a retired former City of Winnipeg director of streets and transportation, who wrote to the investigating panel in support of Sweryda’s complaint.

“For what it’s worth, I think Chris Sweryda is quite correct in his complaints about speed signing,” Clarke wrote.

“When every other major Canadian city and the Province of Manitoba are all following a particular practice, and Winnipeg is not, and the result is tickets issued to law-abiding, well-intentioned drivers, something is wrong.”

Clarke, who retired in 1995, called the city’s policy “predatory” and a “blatant revenue grab” aimed at “tripping up responsible drivers on minor technicalities.”

But Michael Jack, the city’s current chief administrative officer, defended Escobar in the matter in a series of letters sent to APEGM obtained by the Free Press.

In response to Sweryda’s claim the city did not follow national engineering standards and established practices on dual signage, Jack wrote there was nothing in the law requiring it.

Last week, however, the city told the Free Press in a written statement its engineers “adhere to national and local practice guides.”

On March 10, 2017, the Law Society of Manitoba issued two “reminders” to Jack of his professional obligations due to his role in the case.

Jack had changed his practising status to “inactive” on June 30, 2015, which meant he shouldn’t have been working as a lawyer. The law society — which regulates the profession in Manitoba — charged that by defending city employees while a member of the administration, he was in a conflict of interest.

“You continued to represent to APEGM that you were acting on behalf of the three engineers and you continued to be involved in their legal matter on their behalf,” reads the letter.

“It is the belief of the Law Society that you ought not to have been representing the three engineers at all. You certainly ought not to have continued to act for them after changing your status to ‘inactive.’”

In a written statement, the city noted the Manitoba Law Society handled this matter on an “expressly confidential basis.”

“Michael Jack provided an explanation to the Manitoba Law Society and they determined that the complaint was resolved with no further action required by them,” a city spokesman wrote.

“The historical interpretation of the (Manual of Uniform Traffic Control Devices for Canada) by the City had been that the dual provision of signage was optional rather than mandatory, however the department is now supportive, prepared to, and committed to making the change to add the dual signage.”
– A city spokesman in a written statement

Around that time, Sweryda also launched a petition asking the city to change its policy on dual speed-limit signage. It got more than 2,000 signatures. By August 2015, the petition made its way to Mayor Brian Bowman’s desk.

In a written statement, a city spokesman said the department is now supportive of dual signage.

“The historical interpretation of the (Manual of Uniform Traffic Control Devices for Canada) by the City had been that the dual provision of signage was optional rather than mandatory, however the department is now supportive, prepared to, and committed to making the change to add the dual signage,” the statement said.

“We are still investigating the total number of locations where the additional signage would need to be installed (we believe there are 52 locations where this is required), and have committed money… to fund the installation. We anticipate it will be completed within the calendar year.”

Jeremy Patzer, an assistant professor in the department of criminology and sociology at the University of Manitoba, says he believes Sweryda’s research proves the city has been deliberately sacrificing road safety to increase photo-radar revenue.

“We actually see what seems to be the sacrifice of safety for revenue streams.”– Jeremy Patzer, an assistant professor in the department of criminology and sociology at the University of Manitoba

“There are actions and policies undertaken by the authorities that would seem to want to lead us to break the Highway Traffic Act.… Safety is the rationale that is always sold to us, but when it comes down to it, you can see policies that actually sacrifice safety,” Patzer says.

“We actually see what seems to be the sacrifice of safety for revenue streams.”

A city spokesman shot back in a written statement: “The assertion that the City of Winnipeg would deliberately sacrifice safety for revenue is outrageous, unfounded, and categorically untrue.”

On April 6, 2021, Allard moved a motion at the Riel community committee seeking to change the way Winnipeg’s photo-radar system is operated.

He wanted the revenue generated from violations in school zones to be earmarked for road-safety improvements instead of going to police operations.

“The (photo-radar) program needs to be reformed. The program legislation is to better safety. It doesn’t specifically say the dollars should go to police. It says safety. I think for the program to continue to be viable, it needs to look at the roads themselves,” Allard said at the time.

The motion was shot down by councillors Brian Mayes (St. Vital) and Markus Chambers (St. Norbert-Seine River). Chambers, chair of the Winnipeg Police Board, called it “premature.” Mayes went further.

“I think I have concerns as well. Perhaps slightly different concerns than Coun. Chambers. We both sit on the police board. This would be a pretty big reallocation of budget from the police,” Mayes said.

Sweryda believes the city’s behaviour is breathtakingly cynical.

“When I started this, people were saying, ‘Photo radar is about safety.’ Most people now accept that photo radar is a cash grab. But there’s still this attitude of, ‘Well, if you don’t like the ticket, don’t break the law. Don’t give them the chance to get you,’” he says.

“The next step that people need to understand is that it’s not just a cash grab. It’s a cash grab and a trap, sure, but it’s not safety-neutral. It’s actually a detriment to safety.”

ryan.thorpe@freepress.mb.ca

Twitter: @rk_thorpe