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“I think the reason that that is working is if you look at what speed means to children,” saidÌýDr. Andrew William Howard, the lead author of the study. “When I’m on orthopedic call … badly injured child pedestrians are among the worst of the worst injuries that we see.”

While the province sets the rules around the speed camera system, including that they have to be installed in community safety zones, it is the city that establishes where to designate those zones which is often around schools.

Speed is the main determining factor in whether someone dies after being hit by a car.

A recent survey by CAA found nearly three-quarters of the 1,500ÌýOntario drivers it polled in March support the use of speed enforcement cameras.Ìý

“When you reduce speed, you do two things for the injury,” said Howard. “One is you reduce the probability of that injury happening in the first place … Then when you look, at the injury force (if it does happen), are you going to get a mild injury or a severe injury?”

According to the hospital’s study, the impact of speed cameras was “more pronounced” among drivers going the most over the speed limit: the number of cars speeding at 10 kilometres or over reduced by 74 per cent, drivers going 15 kilometres or more decreased by 84 per cent and drivers speeding at 20 kilometres or more over the speed limit dropped by 88 per cent.

One limitation of the study, it says, was that it took place during the first couple of years of the COVID-19 pandemic when unprecedented disruptions, school closures and lockdowns meant significant changes in transportation patterns. “These factors may have affected vehicle speed and volume. The observed results, however, strongly argue that (automated speed enforcement) was the primary factor in the speed reductions,” the study said.”

The findings are consistent with a previous report from 2022 by the hospital and º£½ÇÉçÇø¹ÙÍøMetropolitan University analyzing speed and collision data.

Speed cameras have been a controversial issue in º£½ÇÉçÇø¹ÙÍøsince their implementation in 2020. But the cameras have been propelled back into the spotlight and into headlines in recent months following of municipalities using them as a revenue tool, Vaughan Mayor Steven Del DucaÌýsuspending his municipality’s program and in Toronto,Ìývandals decapitating speed cameras repeatedly.

City staff have repeatedly denied the cameras are a cash grab. “If you don’t speed, you don’t get a ticket,” the municipality’s head of transportation services recently said.

(Fines for speeding are set by the province under the Highway Traffic Act. The fine amounts areÌý.)

Last month, a city councillor floated the idea of suspending Toronto’s program until city staff can review it (which didn’t happen).

In October, Toronto’s speed camera program will beÌýup for debate again at city council’s infrastructure and environment committee to discuss aÌýstaff report about the list of safety risks involved with limiting tickets for first-time offenders. Meanwhile, some members of council want a review of the appeals process for the tickets, which they say has been plagued with technical problems.

“What are we intending for the children in the school zones?” Howard said, when asked about these recent events in the news.

The doctor went on to explain that when there are cars driving at high speeds in school zones, the less likely it is for children and parents to choose walking to get around in their own neighbourhoods.

“And so the two consequences that you get by controlling the speed? First, you get rid of one of the biggest threats to children’s health in a North American city,” Howard said.

“But more importantly, if you create an environment where the traffic situation is allowing and encouraging more children to walk, it’s that daily physical activity that is the biggest thing that the kids can do about their lifelong health.”