Group hopes (yellow) sticker shock will lead to safer roads

The group behind the tiny yellow stickers that are being spotted at intersections all over Vancouver hopes they will lead to safer roads.

No bigger than a person’s palm and affixed to lampposts, the labels reveal how many crashes occur every year, on average, at major intersections.

“It is illuminating for a lot of people who walk by it, because you only hear anecdotally when there are car crashes,” said Jade Buchanan, a volunteer with Vision Zero Vancouver.

His team believes crashes can be prevented if speed limits are reduced and roads are redesigned. Another option Buchanan suggested was eliminating right-hand turns at red lights.

He said all of this could be done, but at the moment “the political will isn’t there.”

“If a street feels like a highway, people are going to drive on it like it’s a highway, even if it’s, you know, a major shopping street,” said Buchanan.

The sticker at Oak Street and 70th Avenue reads “81 crashes a year at this intersection,” whereas the one at Main Street and Terminal Avenue states that 108 crashes occur on average.

The volunteer group told CTV News it gets its data from statistics that are available online trough ICBC.

“If you tell somebody, 'Hey, I am going to lower the speed limit on your commute to work by 10 km/h,' they may say, 'Hey, that’s annoying,'" said Buchanan.

“But if you tell somebody, 'Hey, we’re going to adjust the road design on your commute to work to reduce the odds that you get in a car crash down to zero,' that’s a sale,” he argued.