The Crosswalk Safety Society of Nova Scotia is looking for ways to improve pedestrian safety in Halifax Regional Municipality (HRM).

During a Transportation Standing Committee meeting Thursday, Norm Collins, president of the Crosswalk Safety Society of Nova Scotia gave a presentation on the society’s 2023 annual report on road safety.

“We presented the report as a report card, in which you can see there are many areas where expectations are not being met,” Collins says.

The report shows that there was an increase in pedestrian collisions and impaired driving.

The enforcement section on the report received an "F." The Crosswalk Safety Society of Nova Scotia measured the number of Summary Offence Tickets (SOTs) issued. The society found that speeding SOTs were down 70 per cent in 2022 compared to 2012 and distracted driving SOTs were down 64 per cent in the same timeframe.

“Attention to enforcement has actually been reduced rather than increased,” Collins says. 

Education also received a "F" on the report due to lack of education or outreach programs over the past five years.

The report says social media has been the only medium to communicate information and has been “sparse.” Heads Up Halifax, a crosswalk safety campaign, was implemented to improve education on crosswalk safety for both pedestrians and drivers. But as investments were scrapped, the report says this demonstrates “how unimportant education is viewed by Regional Council.”

Councillors agreed that more needs to be done for pedestrian safety. 

“It is just getting beyond frustrating that we are not meeting the mark for pedestrian safety in school zones,” Lovelace says. 

Over 50 per cent of roads in HRM are provincially owned and managed, Lovelace says this makes it difficult to advance public safety initiatives on those roads. 

Coun. Patty Cuttell says more education should be done in schools about road safety. 

“I don’t believe education is the key to road safety, I think it's very important,” Collins says “But I think engineering and enforcement has a bigger impact.”

The Nova Scotia Driver’s Handbook has not been updated since 2005, something that Coun. Waye Mason says, should be the first step when looking to create safer roads in HRM.

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