I hope everybody is alright!

And then one learns today that the Premier of the province intentionally ran a red light with a child and a newspaper reporter in the car! It was at night, apparently. But to disobey traffic laws is NEVER o.k. and unfortunately it is too late to elect a new leader.

When I went by, the jeep was laying flipped over on the drivers side.

Are we sure she RAN a red light, which I understand to mean that one is actually speeding through a light without first stopping.

In the ealy morning, when there are few if any other cars on the road, one may actually stop at the red light, just as at a stop sign, sit there waiting for the light turning green, noticing that it is not turning green and that no cars are coming in either direction and make a decision that it is safe to drive across the intersection.

Yes, it is breaking a law, but, it is a safe practice putting no one’s life at risk anymore than when the same procedure is done at a stop sign.

In fact, some signals in more advanced comunities operate as flashing yellow in one direction and flashing red in the other direction at night.

It’s breaking the law. Plain and simple. She admitted it and she also said that she should NOT have done it.

There is always the possibility that one fails to see that other vehicle coming out of nowhere.

Just yesterday someone apparently ran a red light in Surrey and killed five people who thought that it was safe to proceed on a green light.

I don’t buy your excuses, Gus. Sorry.

You do not have to be sorry. Hey, then this is a Canadian site, eh? ;-)

BTW, I did say “Yes, it is breaking the law..”

Did you ever jaywalk in your life?

One other consideration when it comes to signalized intersections.

Look at the initial cause of the problem. It is an engineering problem first of all.

Rotaries, traffic circles, or roundabouts would get rid of signalized and stopsigned intersections.

I see it starting to happen in many areas. More and more money is being put to removing lights and installing roundabouts in order to reduce the severity as well as the number of crashes at intersections. They are far more flexible than trafficlights

I have done what Gus is talking about in the past on my motorcycle. Sometimes the sensors just dont pick up a bike and you can sit there as long as you want without getting the light. When it happens it is usually at a time when there is no other traffic around to trip the signal for you. Choices – get off and hit the walk button or run the red…

At least you came to a “STOP” interceptor!

Gus, what is your point about this being a Canadian site?

Yes, I have jaywalked but I have never crashed into another person while doing so and killed him/her or put them into a hospital. Apples and oranges, man!

Interceptor has a problem which should be solved by improved vehicle presence recognition technology. Usually backing up or moving ahead a few times will trigger the sensors.

Many intersections in P.G. have motion detector *cameras* looking in each direction (Bypass for example) to modulate the lights. Perhaps they need to be programmed to recognize vehicles which stopped at a red light.

In any case, the lady couldn’t have been in such a hurry (it wasn’t an emergency) and the fact that she did this in spite of the fact that she had a child and a newspaper reporter in the car (!) makes me think that she was not concentrating on how she was driving and it was probably done out of habit.

I am in the US at the moment, so am becoming more conscious about the apologetic Canadians. :-)

You wrote “I don’t buy your excuses, Gus. Sorry.”

The last word is the Canuck attitude. Why should one be sorry about not agreeing with someone?

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I have seen people get out of the car to activate the light at Lansdowne and Ferry because it takes too long to allow a left turn onto Ferry, then run back to the dirvers side to get in.

We have SMART meters, and a few SMART lights, such as the one at the bypass and 10th. Most of the others are very DUMB lights that need to be retrained.

Sorry, but that is my feeling. :-)

Enjoy your stay in the US, Gus! We are having some little snow flurries! You are right, we don’t have to apologize for being polite. Sorry, but it never hurt anyone! ;-)