Re: ‘She was the love of my life,’ The Leader, March 25.
So very, very many loves of our lives have been claimed by cars over the decades – especially in absurdly and pathetically car-dependent Surrey – as newspapers such as your own routinely tell us.
But to what avail? At best, you blame the driver, yet you know these accidents are inevitable at a predictable rate. Why? Because our roads, and Surrey’s in particular, are dangerous by design. And whose fault is that? Not we drivers nor pedestrians, but the planners, councillors and mayors who approved the roads, and the community’s development, at the behest of developers who insisted Surrey be built around the need to have a car – to shop, commute, take the kiddies to school, hockey, etc. as fast as possible pedestrians be damned.
A significant number of kids walking to school are run down by massive SUVs wielded by moms and dads rushing their own children two or three blocks to school.
Judges, prosecutors, lawyers and ICBC need to put the blame and financial liability for every car accident partially to entirely on the city, municipality, province, region, feds or TransLink, depending on whose road it is. Then, and only then, will we lose less of our loved ones to this entirely preventable, ultimately profit-driven carnage, seen as mere collateral damage necessary for our sick, cold, callous, uncaring, self-focused lifestyle to continue to flourish in the way it does.
Don DeMille