North Bay traffic safety becoming a community safety issue

North Bay's deputy police chief believes traffic safety is becoming a community safety issue. 

Mike Daze expressed some concerns regarding traffic accident statistics that he was comparing from Jan. to Sept. 2022 to Jan to Sept. 2023.  

The statistics showed a rise in 83 accidents from 2022 to 2023 with an increase as well in intersection-related collisions. However, the numbers also revealed that in 2023, there was a decrease in injuries relating to vehicle collisions. 

Daze was also surprised to find out that many of the collisions were not connected to winter or nighttime conditions. 

"What the data really says is it's about our driving skills," he said. 

"It's about being attentive, it's about making sure we do not follow too closely behind vehicles giving some time and space to be able to react if another vehicle doesn't manoeuvre that may put you at risk of an accident. So it is really about, you know, being cognizant alert as a driver, as opposed to blaming environmental conditions that may be around us."

Daze noted some changes in primary accident locations noting that Algonquin and Front/Jane, a traditionally dangerous intersection has fallen off the list likely due to the added lanes put in place last fall. 

"We have had in the past challenges at Algonquin and Front — work's been done there and it's been successful, we've seen that drop down in terms of the number of accidents. 

"We still do see a lot of accidents in the area of Main and Oak Street, but we saw out of 2023 was a lot more accidents in that first little corridor of Lakeshore Drive so of our top six, 45 per cent of the accidents in total were included in that Lakeshore Drive stretch which is a busy stretch and that goes back to just being alert of the traffic around us but is an area we have to be cognizant of."

Daze notes Main and Oak was the top accident location in 2022 with 10 reported collisions, and in 2023 Cassells and McIntyre led the way with 13 collisions.