Latest news with #speedcamera
Globe and Mail
6 days ago
- General
- Globe and Mail
Here's a radical idea to avoid speed camera tickets - forget vandalism and just don't speed
Throughout the annals of human struggle, there have been iconic acts of heroic protest. Acts such as Gandhi's Salt March in 1930, the Civil Right's Movement's Montgomery Bus Boycott of the 1950s and Czechoslovakia's Velvet Revolution in 1989. Will the 'Parkside Speed Camera Decapitations of 2025' one day be recorded alongside such illustrious acts? What's that you say? You've never heard of the 'Parkside Speed Camera Decapitations?' Think of them (there's no way a single individual is responsible) as 'Robin Hoods' but instead of stealing from the rich to give to the poor, these champions cut down the defenseless Automated Speed Enforcement (ASE) cameras under the cover of darkness. Their sacred quest? To preserve their right to speed and jeopardize people's safety. The Parkside Vandaliers, as I'll call them, get their name from the picturesque Toronto street that runs along the east side of High Park, struck their latest blow sometime during the night of May 22. While the good people of the west end slumbered, they toppled over the Parkside Drive speed camera. It was the fifth time in six months that the Vandaliers had struck. Credit where credit is due. What they lack in integrity they make up for in consistency. The Vandaliers have sawed the speed camera down, hacked it down and dragged it 200 metres to deposit in a duck pond. The attacks on vulnerable speed cameras have Torontonians in shock, dumbfounded by yet another example of man's inhumanity to soulless metal objects that can't feel anything. 'It's just Groundhog Day,' Faraz Gholizadeh, co-chair of the community group Safe Parkside, told The Toronto Star, alluding to the 1992 comedy starring Bill Murray as curmudgeonly weatherman Phil Connors who must repeat February 2 over and over until he experiences spiritual growth. Spiritual growth seems unlikely for the Parkside Vandaliers, a group of people who get their jollies lurking around at night lopping the heads off speed cameras. The Parkside Camera massacres are not isolated incidents. These are just a few of many acts of man-on-speed-camera vandalism in Toronto. There are 150 speed cameras in the city. Municipal officials say there have been 325 acts of speed camera vandalism so far in 2025. Though they have not issued a manifesto; it's a fair bet that the Vandaliers target the Parkside speed camera because it is emblematic of what they consider a 'cash grab.' It's Toronto's top-grossing ASE device, having issued 65,000 speeding tickets worth around $7-million since 2021. All 150 cameras bring in $40-million. Speed camera advocates note that Parkside Drive is one of Toronto's most dangerous streets. It's a 2.5-kilometre north/south arterial road that runs between a residential area and a park. According to a report by the city, about 21,000 motor vehicles and 1,000 transit passengers travel daily on Parkside Drive. 'Over the 10-year period between August 2014 and August 2024 there have been 1,487 collisions on Parkside Drive between Bloor Street West and Lake Shore Boulevard West. Of the collisions, five resulted in serious injuries and two resulted in fatalities.' The Parkside speed camera was erected in 2021 after a terrible five-car crash claimed the lives of two seniors. The driver responsible, Artur Kotula, had been told by an emergency doctor that he should not drive because he was suffering from seizures caused by alcohol use disorder. Kotula drove anyway, going more than 100 kilometres an hour in a 50 zone. In March, Kotula was found guilty of two counts of dangerous driving causing death and two counts of dangerous driving causing bodily harm and sentenced to 6.5 years in prison. You might think that the Parkside Vandaliers would be angry at folks like Kotula (who, along with his sentence, was given a 15-year driving suspension) but apparently not, because his head is still attached to his body. They're angry at speed cameras. Their ire is not exclusive to Toronto. In 2020, someone spray-painted the lens of Hamilton's first photo radar camera. In 2021, three speed cameras were vandalized in the Niagara region. Nor is it exclusively Canadian. In Italy, a person or a group calling itself 'Fleximan' spent 2024 cutting down photo radar devices. The BBC reported that Fleximan – a pun on the Italian word for angle grinder, 'flessibile' – had cut down 15 'autovelox' and left a note saying, 'Fleximan is coming.' When I imagine the Parkside Vandaliers at work, I picture them celebrating the decapitation of an automated speed enforcement device by exclaiming at the top of their lungs, 'Take that, lifeless speed camera machine that can feel nothing and will be replaced shortly!' And yet, while I admire the Parkside Vandaliers' out-of-the-box thinking – Don't like speed cameras? Decapitate them – I question their logic. Surely there are other ways to avoid getting speeding tickets that do not involve power tools and the nocturnal maiming of automated speed enforcement devices. You know, like not speeding. Maybe I'm just not radical enough.
CTV News
24-05-2025
- CTV News
Parkside Drive speed camera vandalized for fifth time in six months
A speed camera on Parkside Drive was vandalized for the fifth time in six months. Over 300 speed camera vandalism reports across the city in 2025.
CBC
23-05-2025
- CBC
Toronto's Parkside Drive speed camera cut down for 5th time in 6 months
For the fifth time in six months, the Parkside Drive speed camera in Toronto's west end has been cut down. Faraz Gholizadeh, co-chair of the community group Safe Parkside, says the speed camera was taken down sometime Thursday night or early Friday. As of Friday morning, the camera was removed from the area, and what remains is a cut off pole. The speed camera was cut down twice in November. Then in December, vandals cut down the camera and dumped it into a nearby duck pond. The camera was then downed again in April. Residents have long criticized the street as dangerous, citing heavy traffic and speeding drivers. Safe Parkside was formed in 2020, but residents have been calling on the city to make the street safer for over a decade, Gholizadeh said. In October 2021, an older couple was killed when they were stopped at a red light on the street and a man driving at high speed collided with them. That prompted the city to launch an ongoing study of the street, reduce the speed limit from 50 km/h to 40, as well as add speed cameras, new traffic signals and signs telling motorists to reduce their speed. Since it was installed in April 2022, the camera has issued over 65,000 tickets and more than $7 million in fines, according to Safe Parkside.
CTV News
20-05-2025
- CTV News
Speed camera stolen from Paris, Ont.
Ontario Provincial Police are looking for a missing speed camera from Paris, Ont. Police said the camera had been set up in front of North Ward Elementary School on Silver Street. They believe it was taken during the early morning hours of May 18. A suspect description is not available yet as the police investigation continues.
CTV News
14-05-2025
- CTV News
Swiss speed camera captures duck flying at 52 km/h
A photo posted by the Swiss Municipality of Köniz on Facebook shows a duck in an image captured by speed camera. Geneva, Switzerland — A radar image of a speed offender caught in central Switzerland last month revealed that the culprit was not only a duck, but likely a repeat offender, local authorities said. Police in the town of Koniz, near the capital Bern, were astounded when they went through radar images snapped on April 13 to discover that a mallard was among those caught in the speed trap, the municipality said on its Facebook page at the weekend. The duck was caught going 52 kilometres (32 miles) an hour in a 30-km zone, the post said. The story, first reported by the Berner Zeitung newspaper on Monday, got even stranger. It turned out that a similar-looking duck was captured flying in the ame spot at exactly the same speed, on exactly the same date seven years earlier, the Facebook post said. The municipality said it had considered whether the whole thing might not be a belated April Fool's joke or a 'fake' picture. But the police inspectorate said it was impossible to doctor images or manipulate the radar system. The computers are calibrated and tested each year by Switzerland's Federal Institute of Metrology (METAS), and the photos taken are sealed, the municipality explained.
