Welcome Guest!
In order to take advantage of all the great features that Waterloo Region Connected has to offer, including participating in the lively discussions below, you're going to have to register. The good news is that it'll take less than a minute and you can get started enjoying Waterloo Region's best online community right away.
or Create an Account




Thread Rating:
  • 4 Vote(s) - 4.5 Average
  • 1
  • 2
  • 3
  • 4
  • 5
Walking in Waterloo Region
Regardless of what your opinion is on ploughing or any other City issue be sure to let the City of Kitchener know your thoughts.

Budget survey open until January 5, 2018.


As always some very ill-informed comment section with much confusion over what is a Regional service vs. what is a City service vs. what is a provincial service:
-"way to much money has been spent on the lrt."
-"hospitals deserve more money"
-"I have never talked to anyone who was for the LRT.The study showed the best option for us was improved Busses.Carl Zehr legacy?"
-"The iOn has been a huge waste of money and they haven't managed to complete any of their proposed deadlines. Why is the city allowing them to waste taxpayer dollars month after month?"
-"GRT investment not as good as it should be"
-"Transit is overpriced."
-"I live next near Schneider Haus and am frustrated that the city mismanaged and left 2 properties vacant for years only to now determine them fit for demolition."
-" I would also like to see the city pick up our garbage"
-"We lost our front lawn to drought a few years ago due to watering bans"
-"Too much emphasis on bike lanes and not enough on traffic flow."
-"Let the LRT pay for itself."



Some privilaged comments as well:
-"winter road clearing could be better"
-"Too much emphasis on bike lanes and not enough on traffic flow."
-"The new subdivisions are hideously overcrowded."
Everyone move to the back of the bus and we all get home faster.
Reply


Unhappy people always speak the loudest ...
Reply
(12-17-2017, 11:07 PM)tomh009 Wrote: Unhappy people always speak the loudest ...

Unhappy people are rarely aware of what would make them happy ...
Reply
(12-17-2017, 10:16 AM)ijmorlan Wrote: [quote pid='46390' dateline='1513479592']

Maybe I’m wrong and a reasonable city effort to clear snow from all sidewalks would eliminate the legal liability. If so, then that is yet another reason for the city to do that. Rather than wasting money on settlements, spend it on clearing snow.

[/quote]

Respectfully, you are wrong, and plam is a lot closer to the mark when he talks about "reasonability" tests being applied. If a person slips on a sidewalk, it's not black and white who is at fault, and likely a portion of the liability rests with both the person and the municipalities (and maybe others, who knows).

There are cases (I'm thinking of one in particular involving an aged woman in Hamilton) where someone trips on a crack in a sidewalk, the City is held liable, and people are up in arms because everyone should just watch where they're going. In the case I'm thinking of, the City was aware of the unlevel pavement, and didn't even follow its own insufficient policies. Even with that, the City was not 100% at fault, and the woman's behaviour was a contributing factor.

It's not helpful to say that "suing after a slip-and-fall is unreasonable." A person should be able to have some expectations about the infrastructure in his or her city. When that's not met, of course pursuing legal action should be an option.
Reply
(12-19-2017, 08:59 AM)MidTowner Wrote:
(12-17-2017, 10:16 AM)ijmorlan Wrote: [quote pid='46390' dateline='1513479592']

Maybe I’m wrong and a reasonable city effort to clear snow from all sidewalks would eliminate the legal liability. If so, then that is yet another reason for the city to do that. Rather than wasting money on settlements, spend it on clearing snow.

Respectfully, you are wrong, and plam is a lot closer to the mark when he talks about "reasonability" tests being applied. If a person slips on a sidewalk, it's not black and white who is at fault, and likely a portion of the liability rests with both the person and the municipalities (and maybe others, who knows).

There are cases (I'm thinking of one in particular involving an aged woman in Hamilton) where someone trips on a crack in a sidewalk, the City is held liable, and people are up in arms because everyone should just watch where they're going. In the case I'm thinking of, the City was aware of the unlevel pavement, and didn't even follow its own insufficient policies. Even with that, the City was not 100% at fault, and the woman's behaviour was a contributing factor.

It's not helpful to say that "suing after a slip-and-fall is unreasonable." A person should be able to have some expectations about the infrastructure in his or her city. When that's not met, of course pursuing legal action should be an option.
[/quote]

Thanks for that. It sounds like things might be more reasonable than I fear. I still wonder if the de facto laws that the city has to follow in order to not be liable are infeasible to follow. I worry that judges impose a “should have” standard that implies a requirement for an impossibly expensive effort. But if it’s situational, it might not be as bad as I think. As with many issues that arise in the news, I am often frustrated by a lack of basic facts that I (unlike some people) need in order to form a firm opinion.
Reply
Here is an article that explains a bit about when municipalities in Ontario are in practice found liable. It includes some scenarios from a case in Cambridge.

http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/hamilton/n...-1.3108350 about the case I was thinking of about the damaged sidewalk in Hamilton. I think the details are interesting. The victim's negligence was found to contribute to the incident, but the case rested on the fact that the City did not take every reasonable effort to maintain the sidewalk, and did not follow its own policies.

Sorry, I know that's not about snow, but it came to mind as illustrative of how these cases are actually decided. The actual rulings can be interesting- they are highly situational, and victims are asked questions about how often they traverse a specific stretch of sidewalk, how aware they were of their surroundings and conditions that day, whether they may have been distracted, in addition to questions about City policies and how well they were adhered to.
Reply
(12-19-2017, 10:11 AM)MidTowner Wrote: Here is an article that explains a bit about when municipalities in Ontario are in practice found liable. It includes some scenarios from a case in Cambridge.

http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/hamilton/n...-1.3108350 about the case I was thinking of about the damaged sidewalk in Hamilton. I think the details are interesting. The victim's negligence was found to contribute to the incident, but the case rested on the fact that the City did not take every reasonable effort to maintain the sidewalk, and did not follow its own policies.

Sorry, I know that's not about snow, but it came to mind as illustrative of how these cases are actually decided. The actual rulings can be interesting- they are highly situational, and victims are asked questions about how often they traverse a specific stretch of sidewalk, how aware they were of their surroundings and conditions that day, whether they may have been distracted, in addition to questions about City policies and how well they were adhered to.

What bugs me about this, is that it seems to require a specific harmful event (someone falling).  The thousands of people who simply cannot leave their home in the winter because sidewalks are never cleared probably can't sue.  Litigation is a pitiful substitute for legislation.
Reply


(12-19-2017, 10:17 AM)danbrotherston Wrote:
(12-19-2017, 10:11 AM)MidTowner Wrote: Here is an article that explains a bit about when municipalities in Ontario are in practice found liable. It includes some scenarios from a case in Cambridge.

http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/hamilton/n...-1.3108350 about the case I was thinking of about the damaged sidewalk in Hamilton. I think the details are interesting. The victim's negligence was found to contribute to the incident, but the case rested on the fact that the City did not take every reasonable effort to maintain the sidewalk, and did not follow its own policies.

Sorry, I know that's not about snow, but it came to mind as illustrative of how these cases are actually decided. The actual rulings can be interesting- they are highly situational, and victims are asked questions about how often they traverse a specific stretch of sidewalk, how aware they were of their surroundings and conditions that day, whether they may have been distracted, in addition to questions about City policies and how well they were adhered to.

What bugs me about this, is that it seems to require a specific harmful event (someone falling).  The thousands of people who simply cannot leave their home in the winter because sidewalks are never cleared probably can't sue.  Litigation is a pitiful substitute for legislation.

Or just doing the right thing without being forced.

I wonder though if an AODA complaint couldn’t be made. To me it is absolutely unacceptable that sidewalks are effectively unusable by many with reduced mobility. I don’t expect perfect equality between people of different levels of mobility — the fact that snow and ice are disproportionately a problem for those with less mobility is a fact of physics, not human-created discrimination — but better snow clearing would be a big benefit for everybody and even more so for those with reduced mobility.
Reply
More maddening verbiage:

https://kitchener.ctvnews.ca/video?clipId=1315089
Reply
What's maddening about it? They used active words (the car hit the pedestrian), neutral language (the pedestrian was crossing the road) and stuck to reporting the facts (police say the pedestrian was jay walking).
Reply
They said the pedestrian was jaywalking and might be charged, but as others have pointed out here, jaywalking is only illegal (and a thing) in Toronto. It doesn't exist anywhere else
Reply
CTV simply reported that the police said the pedestrian was jay walking and charges were pending. That seems like relevant information to report on. Be angry at the police if anything. CTV was reporting the facts in this case.
Reply
The pedestrian may still have acted recklessly in choosing to cross when/where they did; if their timing was poor for the traffic conditions it's still on them.
Reply


The pedestrian was public intoxication and failure to use a crosswalk.
Everyone move to the back of the bus and we all get home faster.
Reply
(01-30-2018, 11:45 PM)Pheidippides Wrote: The pedestrian was public intoxication and failure to use a crosswalk.

I was wondering if that might not be the case.  How close do you have to be to a crosswalk in Kitchener to merit a charge of failure to use it?
Reply
« Next Oldest | Next Newest »



Forum Jump:


Users browsing this thread: 4 Guest(s)

About Waterloo Region Connected

Launched in August 2014, Waterloo Region Connected is an online community that brings together all the things that make Waterloo Region great. Waterloo Region Connected provides user-driven content fueled by a lively discussion forum covering topics like urban development, transportation projects, heritage issues, businesses and other issues of interest to those in Kitchener, Waterloo, Cambridge and the four Townships - North Dumfries, Wellesley, Wilmot, and Woolwich.

              User Links