There’s no question Transportation Minister Devin Dreeshen will make Alberta’s highways deadlier with his plan to raise speed limits in several locations.
He’s already made them more dangerous with his half-baked decision to eliminate photo radar on provincial highways and restrict its use at intersections, a policy that took effect, appropriately, on April Fool’s Day.
But Mr. Dreeshen, like many in the United Conservative Party Government, approaches his transportation portfolio with a perspective like that of teenager with poor impulse control and the keys to his dad’s Dodge Ram pickup.
Let’s parse the language used in Mr. Dreeshen’s Nov. 7 news release announcing the UCP’s plan to “engage with Albertans on increasing speed limits on rural highways.”
Here’s his canned quote from the release: “Alberta’s government is investigating how to safely increase speed limits on divided highways, and if Albertans support increasing speed limits. We are investing more than $1.5 billion this year alone to improve highway safety and upgrade infrastructure across the province. We want Albertans to be able to drive the speed limit that the highways are designed for. Modern vehicles combined with public awareness mean we can explore higher speed limits.”
Naturally, the author of the release wants us to think the government intends to safely increase highway speeds, knowing full well that higher speeds will make crashes deadlier. That much is just physics.
The quote then lays out the government’s deceptive case for doing so, defining money spent on road repairs and keeping bridges from falling down as enhancing safety (sort of true, some of the time), claiming highways are designed for 120 km/h when they are clearly not (try crossing the overpass just south of Leduc at the 110 km/h speed limit), and implying that “modern” vehicles are safer at high speeds (well, they’re probably safer than wooden carriages pulled by horses would have been if they could have gone that fast).
As noted in a previous short post on this topic, the claim that you can have your say by filling out a government survey is essentially meaningless since, in the next breath, the Big D informs readers that the government will “conduct a mini-trial of a 120 km/h speed limit to assess the impacts of higher speed limits on divided highways.”
Ergo, they’ve already decided to do this because the irresponsible set that Mr. Dreeshen appears to exclusively represent wants it. And, as we observed in this space last time, anything is better than talking about the Notwithstanding Clause.
What will actually happen? We can predict this with a reasonable degree of confidence because of what occurred when British Columbia premier Christy Clark’s “Liberal” government, which was really a conservative government, did the same thing in her province in 2014.
A study published by physicians and engineers from the University of British Columbia “looked at crash and insurance claim data from the 1,300-kilometre stretches of highway where the speed limit was raised to 120 kilometres per hour in 2014,” the CBC reported in the fall of 2018.
The study indicated “the number of fatal crashes jumped by 118 per cent, injury claims with ICBC rose by 30 per cent and total insurance claims went up by 43 per cent.” ICBC is the Insurance Corporation of British Columbia, B.C.’s public auto insurance provider.
OK, there are special factors that made driving more dangerous in rural B.C., the researchers noted. “Travel in rural B.C. is particularly hazardous because of a harsh winter climate, mountainous terrain causing curvilinear alignments, fewer roundabouts (which reduce risk of side impact collisions), and the fact that large regions of the province are remote, with limited access to post-crash trauma care,” the researchers said. Fortunately, there’s nothing like that here in Alberta … oh, wait!
Shortly after the study was published and with grownups back in charge in the B.C. Legislature in Victoria, premier John Horgan’s NDP government rolled back the speed limits to 110 km/h on 15 sections of highway throughout the province.
“We know people want to get where they’re going quickly,” said Claire Trevena, B.C.’s transportation minister at the time. “Our job is to help make sure they also get there safely.”
“Since the former government raised speed limits in 2014, serious crashes have been on the rise,” she added. “By rolling back speed limits slightly, our goal is to reduce accidents, keep roads open and protect the lives of British Columbians.”
“Speeding has been one of the top three factors contributing to car crashes, especially in rural and remote areas of B.C.,” Provincial Health Officer Dr. Bonnie Henry said in the release. “Research has shown that reducing speed lowers the number of crashes and severity of injuries, so I am very supportive of the speed limit reductions. …”
Mr. Dreeshen’s previous significant policy decision, celebrated in a juvenile March 27 press release headlined “Alberta is ending the photo radar cash cow,” was removing speed-camera enforcement from major provincial highways including those that run through urban areas. The policy also eliminated “speed-on-green” automatic enforcement at intersections.
“We have officially killed the photo radar cash cow and the revenue-generating ‘fishing holes’ that made Alberta the biggest user of photo radar in Canada,” bragged Mr. Dreeshen, who by the sound of it has a heavy foot when he’s behind the wheel.
The minister first announced the policy was coming in December 2024 and paid no attention to the warnings of police and traffic safety experts that time either.
While it’s too soon to have collected meaningful statistics, anyone who has driven on the Deerfoot Trail in Calgary or the Anthony Henday ring road around Edmonton since April Fool’s Day understands that the result has been an immediate increase in speeding and dangerous driving on provincial roads in both cities.
So far this year there have been 29 traffic fatalities in the city of Edmonton, although not all of them have been on provincial roads. That’s up from 26 last year and much lower numbers during the pandemic when, perhaps, Mr. Dreeshen’s motoring friends were hiding out trying to steer clear of COVID shots.
Shortly after the government’s April 1 announcement, Edmonton Police begged the city’s drivers to slow down, noting that officers now had fewer tools to keep the streets safe.
Speed-on-green ticketing at high-risk intersections is “part of the solution” to dangerous driver behaviour, Deputy Chief Devin Laforce observed at the time. Devin Dreeshen apparently knew better, though.
You can fill out the government’s survey if you wish. It’s biased in favour of Mr. Dreeshen’s plan to raise speed limits, and its suggestion that raising speed limits may help the provincial economy is risible unless you happen to own an auto body repair shop. But you can work around that and let the government know what you really think. It won’t change the plan, but at least you’ll have the satisfaction of being able to say I told you so when the carnage begins.
The second question in the survey is “What do you like about increasing the speed limit on rural divided highways?”
To be fair, the first question is whether or not you agree that increasing the speed limit on certain highways is a good thing.
Couple of things here Dave. I drive on all of AB highways on a regular basis, especially the QE2, weekly. There is virtually nobody except large trucks doing 110 any more. To keep UP w traffic you need to be doing 120 now a lot of the time. Hwys 43 & 49 have had major upgrades recently. Find anyone on 63 doing 110 and ill eat my hat.
It’s a fair point, Michael. However, increasing to 120 (or 110 here in Ontario) just ups the ante. 120 kmh becomes the base and people start to push that up to 130 and higher.
Hello DJC and fellow commenters,
I think that increasing the speed limit is sheer madness. There will, of course, be more fatal collisions and additional injuries that are more serious in non-fatal collisions. I believe that Mr. Dreeshen said that part of the reason to increase the speed limit was that drivers already speed on highways – highway 2 and so on. Well, if that is the case, they will still speed when the speed limits is raised to 120 and cause even more fatal collisions and an even larger number of more serious injuries.
I have some experience in driving in situations where drivers habitually speed. I have driven on highways in the Middle East where drivers drive at speeds far beyond the posted limit. When you drive along the highways, you will see crumpled vehicles that likely would have no survivors or, if anyone did survive, the likely would have been critically injured. When you drive by police lots where damaged vehicles are stored, you see many more vehicles that have been completely crushed.
A second point is that errors will cause more fatal crashes as well. For example, our son drives through Nanton fairly often and he says that he has been driving towards Nanton and has been confronted by vehicles driving in the opposite direction in the wrong lanes. I think he said there is a truck stop between the divided lanes. On one occasion when he phoned the RCMP, the officer told him that this occurs often and that they would send a police vehicle out.
In a recent highway trip, we saw a tractor trailer pull out onto the highway and start driving towards us the wrong way on a divided 4-lane highway. My Husband leaned on the horn to warn the driver who then proceeded to do a u-turn in the middle of the highway, as I could see by looking in the rear view mirror.
Mistakes, lack of reacting quickly enough, and as you say the simple physics of vehicles traveling in a specific direction at a particular speed simply cannot be stopped quickly enough.
When Christy Clark as Minister of Education in B C, she ripped up the teachers’ contract, and the Supreme Court o Canada ruled against the government. It is reported that the cost to hire new teachers etc. was $330 Million. Here is a link to thetyee report on this.
https://thetyee.ca/News/2017/03/25/BC-Pledges-Millions-Teachers/?PageSpeed=noscript
I suppose in politics distraction is a better thing than it is while driving.
The UCP is certainly trying to speed away from its recent problems from using the Notwithstanding clause and the somewhat related MLA recall campaigns now popping up all over like dandelions next to an Alberta highway in spring.
However the problem for them is that changing the speed limits is not a good enough distraction, but I suppose they are desperate as they say, to try change the channel. It probably wasn’t a coincidence that the same thing was also tried in BC a few years before Christy Clark’s government unravelled. Like Smith, she was another radio talk show host and an outsider who led her party to a hard fought come from behind election victory.
Clever distractions work for a while, until they don’t. Smith promised to improve health care and education in Alberta, so far she has done neither. Instead there has been a never ending series of chaotic actions and restructurings, perhaps intended to keep everyone else off balance.
However Albertans are beginning to realize that life in the fast lane may not be so great after all.
Stupidity at its best. This accurately describes this very foolish idea by the UCP to allow increased speed on roads. More deaths will occur due to speeding. Taking away photo radar will add to the mayhem. It is also losing revenue. Who will pick up the costs associated with the lost revenue? Municipalities will!
To begin with, Ralph Klein also contributed to these problems by privatization of driver training, over three decades ago. Despite warnings against it, he did it. The number of careless drivers spiked.
It seems the UCP are carrying on where their hero, Ralph Klein left off. Nobody is any better off with this.
Devin drunkard. Yet another face on Dani’s distractions!
POGO: We do not know that Mr. Dreeshen is a drunkard, as traditionally defined. We do know that he used to drink in his Legislature Building office office with his pals when the shields were up. As I recall, he has promised to behave and we must assume that that is so. DJC
Newton’s law states wind resistance increases with the SQUARE of the speed(velocity). Fuel consumption increases with the CUBE of velocity. No surprise that Dani plans to double oil_sands output. See the connection?
While your observations are correct, I somehow doubt that Smith et al have either the inclination or the education to consider such things. I find it much easier to believe that someone, or many someones, are pissed off about getting a speeding ticket “fer only 10 over the limit, fer Chrissakes!” (The “It ain’t FAIR!!” whine is understood to follow, immediately thereafter.)
The surprising thing is that the Smith malgovernment is only considering a 10 kph increase. If that works (in their “mini-test,” so-called) why not try +20 kph? How about +50 kph? How about NO limit at all, like Germany’s famous autobahns? If the speed demons would only immolate themselves, and NOT take any innocents with them, the potential for Darwin awards would be immense….
Some commenters have referred to the UCP as a death cult. At first, I found that strange, but I now see what they meant. Alberta highways are already a test of survival and they are about to become even more dangerous leading to many more fatalities. Removing photo radar and speed on green cameras is akin to telling Alberta drivers that speed limits are for wimps. It is not uncommon to see three and sometimes four vehicles drive through red lights in Calgary. Red light cameras would solve this insanity in weeks or months, but Dreeshen thinks safety is too woke for Albertans. Making vaccines as difficult to get as possible is another way the UCP facilitates more death. Destroying public healthcare means more death. Maybe Dreeshen was drinking at work again when he came with this nonsense.
I took the speed limit survey and like all UCP engagements, they do not really want to hear what Albertans think, they structure them so you have to answer the way they want to hear it. In addition to this government supporting auto body shops, they are really supporting funeral homes. That becomes clear when you look at this speed limit adjustment, the abolishment of photo radar, restricting COVID shots, the mess with health and so on. Perhaps Smith sold her restaurant or traded it in for a funeral home and auto body shop?
Having travelled HWY 2 hundreds of times over the past 5 years, I would say the 110 speed limit is entirely fictional, and that the average driver is going 120 already, and has been doing so both before and after the photo radar change. The government either needs to figure out how to safely enforce the 110 law (officers are literally in mortal danger when stopped on the shoulder giving out tickets, and as mentioned, photo radar was not keeping speeds down) or admit that the de facto speed on the QEII is 120. Based on my hundreds of hours on that road, my observation is the two biggest threats to safety are volume and vehicles that can’t or won’t get up to at least 110. The high volume means cars pack in way too closely, so if you lose attention for even half a second to look down or away you are in grave danger of a collision. 110 or 120 probably won’t change that situation – an extra lane would but that’s expensive. The other danger, slow vehicles, exacerbates the volume issue by compressing traffic flow down to one lane. If your 1978 Winnebago tops out at 90 please stick to Hwy 2A and make us all safer.
QEII: I used to have to drive that road from Calgary to Edmonton twice every week. I once set my cruise control on 110 and never varied my speed from Leduc to Airdrie, just to see what would happen. I was passed by more than 350 vehicles and I passed four or five trucks. On any trip on that highway one is passed by four to six vehicles going vastly faster than the speed limit, regardless of traffic or weather conditions. Many Alberta drivers seem to be under the charming illusion that having four-wheel drive on their F-150 pickup truck or Chevy Tahoe will allow them to ignore the laws of physics. The number of vehicles overturned in the ditches after every light snow is proof that they are wrong. DJC
And here I thought we were getting a safe and fast TRAIN on arguably our most scary highway 2. Oh well.
We will! As in, B-trains.
Full disclosure, I often set my cruise control to 119 … when traffic volume is light enough, weather & road conditions allow for it, etc., and I religiously follow the 2 second rule. When I can’t maintain that 2 sec distance, I slow down. I still get regularly passed by wanna be Nascar dipshits doing buck 30 and upwards.
Of course, Darwin will take care of the fools who think they are on the Autobahn. My sympathy goes to the victims of those tools. I wonder which category Dreeshan will be in? Darwin bait or collateral damage?
One of the other reasons I never travel at sustained speed above 120 km is I know my tires are NOT rated for it. Nor am I going shell out the dollars to buy high speed tires, or pay for speeding tickets.
Gerald: During my year and a half of commuting between Calgary and Edmonton every weekend 20 some years ago, I was constantly amazed by the number of people who would blow past me around Olds, and then be passed by me near Red Deer while they waited for a Mountie to write them a speeding ticket, and then blow by me once again somewhere around Ponoka. Once I even saw one of these drivers getting a second ticket near Leduc as I made my way toward Edmonton at or near the speed limit. DJC
As many others have already noted, speed limits on Alberta highways are largely considered guidelines, not “rules.” If, repeat, IF Dreeshen et al are serious about “highway safety,” there are many factors beyond speed limits to consider.
The elephant on the divided highway, which Dreeshen et al seem to ignore, is driver competence. A partial list:
• Lack of attention (think cell phone addicts, among others)
• lack of experience (only fixable by practicing, and—critically important!—learning from mistakes)
• overconfidence (our host’s example of the kid with impulse-control issues at the wheel of his dad’s Dodge Ram),
• entitlement (“mine’s bigger than yours, so get outta my way”), and
• lack of confidence (understandable, when a new driver becomes intimidated by the size and bulk of aforementioned Dodge Rams. See also “entitlement.”).
These problem children could perhaps be schooled into better habits and judgement. And perhaps the sun will rise in the west tomorrow morning; I’d bet on that before improved driver training.
This makes the hyperloop-vacuum-suction-tube-thingy between Calgary and Edmonton more attractive every day.
I don’t know if you’ve been on Deerfoot Trail lately, but the loose rocks (larger than gravel, not quite boulders) from road construction are making windshield replacement companies happy. Do physics apply to rocks, too?
Many people won’t slow down once they’re off those highways on connector roads to local communities. It seems like every day another pedestrian is hit by a vehicle. So many Alberta advantages!
Having played a minor role in highway construction from the late 1960’s, I did learn that highways were over-designed [especially on curves] for the proposed speed limit that was posted after construction was finished. As the speed limits have increased since then from 60mph [50mph at night] and 50 mph for trucks, to 100kmph, then 110kmph, the design was already able to accommodate some increases in speed. But as the speed limits increase, the 4+ lane highways have had, or will have, to be repaved with more super-elevation on curves to prevent vehicles from veering off into ditches or medians; or hope that the over-design and construction will allow for the speeds that approach those design limits to work!
On another front, from our new federal Tory government, a project to hire a new PBOfficer who will have more “tact and discretion”, rather than, to my thinking, more “openness and honesty” in reports about Public Budgetting and subsequent Expenditures!!
So they trotted out minister baggins in his short pants for another announcement, bully for him.
I too have spent countless hours going back and forth between the provinces two major cities, and many of its minor ones. Here’s what really bugging me about the whole thing, you don’t really get there any faster, and hey, you might die.
Just do the math. If you’re driving 120 vs 110 you’re driving ten kilometres an hour faster, greatly increasing the likelihood of a crash, and the faster you go the more likely it will be fatal. So in that time you’ve driven a whole ten kilometres further, did you stop for gas? Was there any point where you had to dramatically slow your speed (again increasing the likelihood of a collision) ? If you drive like an absolute maniac from airdrie to Leduc (barring weather issues, traffic or gasoline alley visits you save maybe a half hour out of a three hour trip. You burn much more gas, and it’s much more stressful because you’re trying to play Mario kart with all the other cars. It’s stupid.
Dreeshan being obsessed with this just proves to me that conservatives cannot do math, and are impatient whiny babies who NEED to be ahead of the car behind them even if they’re really just setting themselves up for disaster.
What a metaphor for the UCP.
And the good governors of Victoria and area have mandated a drop of speed limits to 30 and 40kph though out large parts of the cities cause a collision at 30kph is almost never fatal.
Lots of research proving that speed does kill.
Just saying!
Not even a modern car can adequately compensate for poor road conditions and an incompetent driver. Nor will its safety features keep you safe in a high speed collision at 120+ km/h. Who is this dough head, and does he have any qualifications to make these assertions about road safety.
I just wanted to add this bit of research to my previous snarky post.
If you’re driving at 120 km/h, you are twice as likely to die in a crash than if you are driving at 100 km/h. If you’re driving at 130 km/h, you’re three times as likely to die.
Devin pay attention if you can.
The likelihood you’ll kill someone else also goes up exponentially with the increase in velocity. Speed kills. Truly. Fewer people should drive.
So as an expat Albertan, I’m wondering why the rural base (since this is surely where it’s coming from) would want higher speed limits. Is it just some libertarian thing where they feel the need to change laws that inconvenience them?
Speaking of laws, we here in Ontario also lost our photo radar, thanks to Doug Ford (and against the wishes of big city mayors). It irritates me more than a little bit that conservative voters (because that’s where the backlash comes from…just check out any newspaper from Sun Media) are such hypocrites on this. They can’t be seen as being against law and order so they frame it in terms of it being a tax grab. But if that were true, it’s the best, and most conservative form of tax that could ever exist, because it is 100% avoidable with just a slight movement of your foot (all taxes should be like that!). But we here know that what this is really about is the new conservative ethos where there are two types of people: one type which the law protects but does not bind and the other that the law binds but does not protect.
Like Christy Clark when she was Premier in B.C., she wants to get home from Edmonton faster. She also thinks, the faster the car goes, the more fuel it burns, the more the oil patch gets supported. Because we all know, she loves the patch and loves burning up our resources, not caring about Alberta’s future generations. And of course, the more shit she throws at the wall, the more distraction she creates. She’s a one cow show (transitive verb; To frighten or subdue with threats, or a show of force: Intimidate. An unpleasant, annoying, vacuous woman.) in a circus that is quickly burning down.
Gunna need more ambulances.
No, Alberta will go back to white vans with sirens, and red crosses on them. The attendants will carry shovels, scrapers, and brooms.
Alberta UCP: We want more skilled workers to come here.
Also Alberta UCP: We want you to burn more gas on the highways and crash more, not to have access to vaccines if you’re immuno-compromised or senior and crappy healthcare that will kill you. Plus we want to under-educated your children so we can sell this plan to them, too.
Make it make sense.
Rather than calling speed limits, why just rename them as speed suggestions?
There’s an advantage in using the nondescript term: how fast one goes on Alberta’s highways (and perhaps someday, its residential streets) can become an interesting cocktail of personal discretion and FreeDUMB. The combination of the two can only yield a spectacular body count, not to mention unmatched hilarity. Watching the sloshed and MAGA cap wearing Devin Dreeshen have to explain why Alberta’s highways are death traps will as interesting as the public officials explaining why Measles and Tuberculous are epidemic in Alberta. Wasn’t the 1820s fun? Let’s do it again!
Yup, and gosh darn it Alburda ken ferget to enforce dem commie seatbelt laws. More freedumb for roadkill!
Speaking of highway maintenance, I once had to drive from Calgary to Edmonton the day after a big winter storm in May (of course). Along the way, especially on the relatively new Stoney Trail inside Calgary, large chunks of ice were falling off the overpasses onto the lanes below. This was contributing to ice buildup on the road. The plows had pushed the snow to the sides where it froze. Then it melted in the sun the next morning. No budget left in May for snow removal?
I managed to swerve to avoid a falling ice block because I was proceeding with caution. Now imagine dodging falling ice blocks on icy roads at 120 km/h. Speed limits are maximums based on ideal road conditions. This is not the reality for many people.
Abs: You’ve reminded me of another of my adventures during my year of commuting every weekend between Calgary and Edmonton. In those days I drove a huge, eight-cylinder Chevrolet Tahoe which drank fuel like a rocket ship but could accelerate like one too. At any rate, one particularly greasy November night with wet snow falling quickly and building up on the road to a consistency not unlike a curling rink, I was reduced to driving about 60 km/h, slower in places, along with most other drivers. At one point, somewhere around Olds, someone blew by me in an almost identical Tahoe at close to or above the legal speed limit. There goes a fellow, I thought, who thinks that four-wheel drive excuses him from having to obey the laws of physics. I continued on, teeth gritted. As I approached Red Deer, there was the Tahoe that passed me, upside down, all doors open, lying in the median between the north- and southbound lanes. No sign of anyone. I guess the ambulance or taxi or whatever had already come and gone. DJC
Maybe the mounties were nearby.
Long ago I didn’t have ice to deal with, but on the highway from Edmonton to Calgary my rear tire blew out and my car crossed the median and the other highway into the ditch. Fortunately there was little traffic and the ditch was shallow, so the only casualties were a post and some fencing. Also fortunately I did not hit the RCMP car parked in the median and the mountie did not need to ask me what happened since he had witnessed it. Afterwards I realized that was just as well, since I had probably put too much air in that tire, lacking experience and good advice.