Jim Kenzie's The Driver's Seat

Even Rick Mercer is After My Job

Motoring TV has been on TSN for 25 years.

For 24 of those, I've been doing Kenzie's Korner, beefing about something or other.

Did we steal the idea from Don Cherry?

Hm-mm - no comment.

Did we steal the 'walking rant' concept from Rick Mercer, initially with This Hour, and now his own Rick Mercer Report?

I dunno - how long has he been doing that? I'm too tired to do the math.

Let's just say that all three of us have fun doing what we do.

Now, since I got my PVR, two things - I never see TV ads any more, or the boring parts of sports events (I've got the quickest fast-forward digit in town - I can watch a baseball game in 20 minutes); and, I can catch up on older stuff I haven't seen.

So while some of you may have seen this particular Rick Mercer Rant when it first appeared back in 2008 (or caught it on one of many car fori on this InterTube thingee where it has been posted) it was new to me when I stumbled across it recently. Maybe it'll be new to you too.

We'll forgive him for calling them 'snow tires' - they're 'winter tires' because they work better in winter even when there is no snow.

But the rest of it?

Spot on.

Check it out here.

 

Bill Blair, Photo Radar, and Cash

[NOTE: This started off as a little blog posting. It evolved into something rather longer. Sorry 'bout that...]

Toronto Police Chief Bill Blair says photo radar should once again be up for consideration because, as his spokesperson Mark Pugash said, "...police officers are a very expensive resource to use for something which technology can do, and much more economically.”

Mr. Pugash added that the force isn’t looking to increase revenue.

No, of course not.

Regular readers would not expect this to go without comment from my own self, especially if they know that former Ontario premier Mike Harris - the guy who killed photo radar in 1995 - personally gave ME credit for getting him elected on this very issue, because I had brought the manifold flaws in this program to light through my stories in Wheels.

(Geez Mike; don't blame ME for getting you elected. My teacher friends have never forgiven me. They might not have known when they had it so good. But I digress...)

The reason I was opposed to photo radar then, as I am opposed to it now, is quite simple: it doesn't work.

Correct me if I'm wrong, Messrs Blair and Pugash, but the point is supposed to be to make our roads safer, yes?

Nothing to do with revenue, as Mr. Pugash confirms.

And the statistical evidence to back up this claim?

ZERO.

How is that possible? 'Everybody' knows that if we drove slower, we would kill fewer people.

Turns out, just as 'everybody' knows by merely looking out their window that the world is flat, 'everybody' is wrong on this score too.

Our fastest roads - our divided highways - are, by any statistical measure, our safest roads, because of superior design and engineering.

There is ZERO statistical evidence that any amount of speed limit enforcement we can even begin to afford will have any measurable effect on the speed we actually drive. If it did, why would they have to keep doing it?

And even if we DID drive slower, there is also ZERO statistical evidence that it would positively affect collision frequency or severity.

Sure, speed can be a contributing factor to the severity of a given crash - I'm not arguing the laws of physics here.

But according to police 'accident' reports, speed is way WAY down on the list of driver actions that lead to collisions.

And never mind that over fifty percent of the photos taken by this technological solution during the former photo radar 'experiment' never resulted in a charge being laid; according to data collected and provided to me by various detachments of the Ontario Provincial Police, in areas where photo radar was most often implemented, traffic deaths actually increased during this time frame, and by substantial measure.

I am not saying - I have never said - that photo radar caused these increases, or even contributed to them.

It is simply yet another piece of evidence that speed limit enforcement:

Simply,

Does,

Not,

Matter.

Now, we know that our federal government ministers are proud that they don't let facts get in the way of their decisions.

Are our provincial and municipal governments falling into that same abyss?

In a vastly previous lifetime, I worked for Procter and Gamble, at the time (possibly even now) one of the best-managed, most profitable companies in the world.

It had a cost reduction program called 'Methods', which encouraged every single employee to examine every single procedure he/she performed, and ask, "If it were not for what 'Basic Cause' could this cost be eliminated?"

In other words, don't start by looking for ways to do things cheaper; start by looking to see if you need to do this thing at all.

Pure common sense, isn't it?

But the one thing we know about common sense is that it isn't very common.

Especially amongst politicians.

So, maybe the way for Bill Blair to save some money on his budget is to tell his officers to stop speed limit enforcement altogether.

It costs huge amounts of money.

We know that.

We know (or are at least told) that the fines accumulated (by the provincial government, as must be repeated, NOT by the Toronto police department) do not begin to cover the expense.

And it is spectacularly ineffective in achieving its stated objective.

If that isn't a cost crying out for elimination, what is?

We also know from various experiments in Holland and elsewhere that eliminating ALL urban traffic controls - lane markings, stop lights, stop signs, pedestrian crossings, everything - can curb the number of collisions, injuries, and deaths.

Cost ELIMINATION, not cost REDUCTION.

And better results.

Who could possibly argue against that?

Assign those existing expensive officers to tasks that actually can make our roads safer, such as moving patrol cars with videotape cameras to catch unsafe driving actions in court-acceptable form, to get lousy and unsafe drivers off the road.

If you still want a technological solution, take the money saved and put it into technology which can return additional benefits.

I'm even all for red-light cameras, because they DO indisputably catch people doing what is among the most dangerous acts possible in an urban traffic environment.

Better still, (again, indisputably) build more roundabouts, which - like divided highways - reduce the possibility of serious collisions due to their superior design and engineering.

And of course, roundabouts do not need red-light cameras.

Yes folks, it really IS that simple.

The people in charge just have to realize that this particular Emperor is not wearing any clothes.

 

Slippery When Wet!

Every year around this time, I try to remember to remind people about this:

Wet leaves on asphalt is about the slipperiest thing in the world except for Hush Puppy shoes on a wet terrazzo tile floor.

And that always makes Hallowe'en - this Wednesday, in case you haven't been paying attention - particularly dicey when the weather is crappy, as it has been all this week.

OK, so it hasn't been the 'Storm of the Century' which our weather fearcasters have been predicting.

Yeah, it's raining.

Yeah, it's windy.

Big deal.

If the subway isn't flooded, it's not that bad.

But if you're driving on residential streets Wednesday evening, take special care to watch for the little witches, goblins, Spiderboys, Batgirls, etc.

Because if one of them does step out in front of your car, it's going to take you longer than usual to stop.

Happy Trick or Treating!

 

Bike Lanes and Jarvis Street redux

Looks like Toronto Mayor Rob Ford will get rid of the Jarvis Street bike lanes after all.

Although the bikeys promise not to give up without a fight, Council voted Wednesday evening to rip them out by the end of the year and put the reversible middle lane back in.

While it would break my heart if I was a Toronto taxpayer to see $300,000 wasted reversing this plan (which should never have been implemented by the former administration of David Miller in the first place) it is the right thing to do.

It is right for vehicular traffic, which needs all the resources we can give it.

And it is right for cyclists, because anything that discourages cyclists from braving downtown Toronto traffic is bound to save some of their lives.

(Why am I more concerned about their safety than they are themselves?)

One councillor who opposed the removal of the bike lanes said the cyclists are going to stay there anyway, bike lanes or no.

Does that mean the cyclists were there before and will remain?

Well, city officials say their numbers have tripled since the lanes were installed.

Which is it?

Those city officials didn't give specific numbers, just that 'three times' ratio.

But when the bike lanes were first introduced last summer the numbers were minuscule.

So three times nothing is nothing.

And as I alwasy say, let's count again in February.

Remove the emotion, and the facts are clear - as I said in the Pottery Road piece a few days ago, bikes and cars cannot mix safely.

Sure, it is the car driver who is (almost always) at fault in a collision (although that bicycle courier I saw die against a concrete pole on Yonge Street some years ago did that all on his own).

But - like that bicycle courier - it is the cyclist who is virtually always dead or seriously injured.

Recreational bike paths are a different issue. Like soccer fields, baseball diamonds, any public facility, it is a matter of priorities and budgets.

But as a means of commuting?

Toronto isn't Copenhagen; it isn't even Montreal.

Never gonna happen.

If City Council can find the budget to build dedicated, segregated bike commuter lanes for the tiny handful of people fortunate/wealthy enough to live in downtown Toronto within biking distance of their jobs (I assume these people have the facilities and time to shower when they DO get to their jobs), then be my guest.

It is a collosal misallocation of tax dollars, to the benefit of a minute fraction of the population.

But at least it won't be MY tax dollars.

Other than the fact that my Ontario and Federal taxes might somehow get mixed up in this scheme.

Damn; why did I have to think of that?...

Completely Pointless Driving Advice from Gray Power

Have you heard those radio ads for “Completely Biased Car Advice” from Subaru?

Kinda cute.

But have you heard those radio ads for “Completely Pointless Driving Advice” from Gray Power Insurance?

Scary.

OK, so I do qualify for Gray Power on the hair colour count.

And no, contrary to that scurrilous comment herein a few weeks ago, I don't dawdle in the left lane with my turn signal (and a hat) on. After all, the Ontario government built the Jim-Only lane for me, and the police departments appear to enforce my exclusive thereof, so why wouldn't I use it?

And the only hat I wear in a car (other than in a convertible - gotta watch out for that sun) always has a Snell sticker in it.

(For those that don't get that reference, that's a racing helmet. Get your own and meet me at the track...).

But I digress.

These Gray Power ads purport to reward 'good' drivers like 'Stewie' - they even wrote a little ditty about him - who always comes to a full stop at every Stop sign.

I guess Gray Power doesn't insure the people who rear-end each other because Stewie - and Stewie alone - came to that complete stop.

The fact is, every Stop sign is an admission of failure to design the intersection properly. Actually, the 'Stops' should all be roundabouts, again like most of the intersections in the UK, but one step at a time...

At the very least, virtually every Stop sign should be a Yield sign which, in the absence of a roundabout, is what they typically use in the UK. The vast majority of even our drivers treat Stop signs as Yield signs anyway.

Hence, Stewie is probably gonna get rear-ended on a regular basis.

For safety, traffic flow management, reduced fuel consumption and lower emissions - never mind everyone getting home sooner - a Yield is what we need.

Yeah yeah, I know what the law says. It's not the only place where, in the words popularized but surely predating Charles Dickens, “The Law is an Ass''.

And it's still down to the traffic planners who do have the option of installing Yield signs instead of Stop signs where they would be more appropriate,

Which is almost everywhere.

Then there's the ad which extols 'Bob' for always checking his blind spots before changing lanes.

Come on, Bob. Open your mind, open your eyes, get with the program.

Do you drive like the young woman I saw in an Acura EL on Bayview the other day who must have driven half the length of a football field looking over her left shoulder, presumably checking her 'blind spot'?

Which, as regular readers know, simply does not exist: crank those side-view mirrors out farther, and presto - no more blind spots.

This young woman definitely would not qualify under the 'over-50' criterion for Gray Power Insurance; just as well, because you wouldn't want her on your roster under any circumstances.

Good for you Gray Power to try and use your platform to communicate driving tips to the general public.

But you've got to make them accurate and useful, not dangerous.

As in:

- Stewie, always back into your parking space so it's safer when you pull out again;

- Bob, learn how to adjust your mirrors correctly;

- everyone, turn on all your lights, all the time, because Daytime Running Lights typically don't illuminate the taillights, and in most of our driving they're more important than the fronts.

Have your copywriters give me a call. I've got enough driving tips for ten years worth of ads.

 

A Pox on All Transponder Ignition Systems

I'm not sure which car to blame, the Honda S2000 or the Bentley Turbo R.

But I'm pretty sure one of those was the first to do away with the oh-so-clever 'old-fashioned' ignition switch - push in the key, one click to the right for ignition, one more for 'run', and one more against a spring-load to work the starter.

If we didn't have that and someone invented it, they'd give him a Nobel Prize.

It has been a short step from there to these damned transponder key systems.

And therein hangs yet another tale...

I did a little TSD (Time Speed Distance) car rally last Sunday, the 'Mini-Monte', organized by three different car clubs. Each started from its own home base, and joined together for the final leg to Pinehurst Conservation Area south of Cambridge.

I drove it in a new Chrysler 300S, a very nice vehicle which has one of these transponder systems.

I parked the car, and for whatever reason (can't remember), tried to re-start it with the door part-way open.

“No Key Detected”.

WHAT? Where the hell is the 'key'?

I had it when we left Georgetown - couldn't have left without it. We never shut the car off between then and here; did it maybe fall out of my pocket as I ran back to get our checkpoint time verified?

In which case, it might be anywhere.

Soon, several people were searching the car. But that was pointless because if it WAS in the car, it would have been detected!

Great. Do I have to get this thing flat-bedded back to Chrysler? Where's my CAA card again?

Then the amazingly awesome (her own description, with which I concur...) Lorraine Sommerfeld, ex of this very newspaper, started rummaging around in the driver's door map pocket.

There it was.

I of course had done a 'man-look' for it in that very spot; it seems it was actually buried underneath something else!

Who knew...

But the question then became - why didn't the car detect it?

Turns out IF the door is open to the first 'detente' - where the door stays open by itself - AND the transponder is either in the cup holder or the very front part of the map pocket (below), it is close enough to one of the five antennae in the car to be recognized.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Two, maybe three cm away (below), and no...

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Happy Ending as it turned out, but Major Angst too.

We had a similar problem some years ago when editor Mark Richardson was turning over a Prius to Gerry Malloy. As I recall the story, Mark drove Gerry and himself to his house in Milton, and Gerry took the car on to his house in Orono, half-way to Peterborough.

He shut the car off - but of course couldn't start it again because the transponder was in Mark's pocket in Milton...

Yeah yeah, most cars (now, anyway, if not then...) beep at you if you drive away without the transponder.

But cars beep at you all the time these days - who pays attention to all those beeps?

And I gather that some cars now will allow ONE re-start without the transponder present, but that surely represents a security risk.

Seriously; what was SO wrong about needing to have the key in the friggin' dashboard, so you ALWAYS knew where it was?

I'm all for new technology, but this makes no sense to me. What does this system offer that forcing you to actually put the key somewhere does not?

Comments as always welcome...

 

Truer words were never - written!

I have made (or tried to make) this point many times over my career.

It might be especially valuable to those who still think they can get away without wearing their seat belts in a car.

Happy Canada day!

 

When Will They Ever Learn?

The pixelboard signs on the 401 yesterday were still talking about 'Checking Your Blind Spots'.

Please.

Blind Spots have as much physical reality as the tooth fairy.

Oops - should have put a SPOILER ALERT in there...

The only blind spots are in the minds of the idiots who put those messages up on the pixelboards.

And, sadly, still in the minds of some of you out there.

I got e-mail-flamed by a young man over this issue. Well, I presume he's young; he still thinks it's cool to drive around in his Jeep with his fog lights on in broad daylight. Most people figure out how stupid that is by the time they can vote.

But he maintained that there ARE blind spots, and that we should be driving down the highway at 100 km/h plus looking over our shoulders instead of looking where we are going.

There also appear to be various commenters here on the blog who support this, um, viewpoint.

Or lack of viewpoint, I should say.

Let me reiterate: if you drive a normal car, or even if you drive a Jeep, THERE ARE NO BLIND SPOTS.

There are only mis-adjusted side-view mirrrors.

This is not merely opinion.

Not that MY opinion shouldn't be enough for you I'M KIDDING HAHAHAHA...

This is science, folks.

Laws of physics.

Laws of optics.

Laws of the reflection of light.

Laws of geometry.

As I noted in the original post, the Society of Automotive Engineers (SAE) published a paper on this.

There is no question. It is 'the sun rises in the east' indisputable.

Even if I can't convince my otherwise bright sister-in-law to, um, see the (reflected) light.

Think about it. Give it a try. Take the chance to learn something new, something that could save you from a serious crash, like the one I almost got into when a Dodge Caravan almost ran me off the road yesterday afternoon - somewhat ironically, shortly after the offending (and offensive) pixelboard.

All that said, there was a ray of hope on a pixelboard sign I also saw on the 407 ETR yesterday, during another of my rare visits thereon:

"Check Your Mirrors. Know What's Around You."

Exactly.

 

Hello Ministry of Transportation - anybody out there?

The Wheels section of the Toronto Star is by far the most widely-read automotive publication in the country.

Last time I looked - well, last time anybody told me - wheels.ca is Canada's Number One automotive web portal.

So why amongst the hundreds (thousands?) of employees of Ontario's Ministry of Transportation, isn't a single one of them reading either the dead-tree or on-line editions?

What else am I supposed to conclude, after what I read on one of the MTO's pixelboard signs on the 401 this afternoon:

CHECK BLIND SPOT BEFORE CHANGING LANES

Geez, people: for the four hundred and ninety-seven million, three hundred and forty-two thousand, six hunded and twenty-seventh (estimated) time:

THERE IS NO SUCH THING AS A BLIND SPOT!!!

As I've been telling you for thirty-five years (and the Society of Automotive Engineers for at least fifteen; took them a while to catch on too...): in the vast majority of cars, if you adjust your side-view mirrors properly - much further out than Granddad probably taught you - the blind spots disappear.

Again, there is no need to see the side of your own car. You know where it is; right where it was when you pulled out of your parking spot earlier in the day at the start of your journey.

It's what's BESIDE the side of your own car that you need to know about.

So why doesn't that pixelboard sign read:

ADJUST SIDE-VIEW MIRRORS TO ELIMINATE BLIND SPOTS

Easy as pie to do.

But then the very next pixelboard sign did read:

SEE AND BE SEEN - USE YOUR LIGHTS

Hmm-mm - maybe somebody who is running these signs does have half a clue! Because you really should have ALL your lights on, ALL the time.

Maybe I have ONE reader at the MTO??

This message was particularly appropriate, given that at this particular point in time it was raining, and you really need to have your full lights on in poor weather so drivers approaching from behind can see you.

Because - as you should know but so many people appear not to know - in most cases, Daytime Running Lights do not illuminate the taillights.

However, at this particular point in time, I'd estimate that about 90 percent of the cars only had their DRL on.

Which means that not many people are reading the pixelboard signs anyway.

Or at least, not heeding the message.

Sigh...

But if the MTO is going to put messages up there, they might as well be the truth!

And if the MTO can't convince their federal counterparts at Transport Canada to mandate that DRL also include taillights, or at the very least make it illegal for DRL to also switch on the dashboard lights, because that's what fools most people into thinking they DO have their lights on, the province should at least follow the lead of several US states (New York being one of them) and maybe some provinces too (not sure...) and mandate that headlights must be on when the wipers are on.

A single stroke of the legislative pen and our roads would be safer, because it would give our police forces the opportunity to create 'learning moments' for our brain-dead drivers.

Hmm-mm - wonder if anybody at Transport Canada is reading?

Probably not...

Double-sigh...

 

Summer in the City

It first struck me when I saw a Bentley Flying Spur sedan tooling down the 400 highway yesterday - with all his windows open.

Hmm-mm - that car obviously has air conditioning; why isn't he using it?

Maybe he had baked beans for lunch?

Then I began to notice others cars with windows open. Maybe one in ten overall, but in one convoy,  I swear there were five or six cars in a row - windows down.

What's up?

After all, yesterday turned out to be the hottest May 25th in the annals of GTA weather history - 30.7 degrees C. at Pearson Airport, according to Environment Canada.

Why are so many people driving around with their windows open?

A sultry day like yesterday also tends to make air quality worse - why are these folks so taken with inhaling smoggy air?

Do they not have air conditioning? Most cars do these days.

Do they have it and it doesn't work? Possibly - A/C often fails, and it can be expensive to repair.

Do they think they're saving fuel?

Not sure it ever has been definitively proven one way or another, but a case can at least be argued that the extra aerodynamic drag caused by open windows burns more fuel than it takes to drive the air conditioning compressor, particularly on the highway.

Do they just like the feel of the warm wind in their hair?

I had a friend many years ago who always drove windows-down, for that very reason.

I dunno.

Anybody got any ideas?