You tell ’em Lindsey!
Lindsey Ramsden works as a traffic flagger in Fort St. John, BC, and she is fed up with drivers who “just don’t care” as they speed by and put her life at risk.
In this audio message to drivers, published by CBC’s Daybreak North, Lindsey describes her frustration with “…the people on their cell phones and the people who are too busy trying to get to work too fast to notice that I’m standing right there.”
Alden Calleja also works on the road in his job with the City of Vancouver’s Waterworks Department. He and his son are among the families who are telling drivers to slow down.
It’s hard to understand why these drivers don’t care about the people they pass. How dare they forget they are driving by an actual human being with a family and a life and people who love them?!
And it’s not just a problem in Fort St. John; it’s something that happens all over our province – and probably most other places with roads.
I wrote about this topic in my post Father and baby tell workers to slow down; that’s their photo, to the right.
Between 2006 and 2015, 14 roadside workers were killed in B.C. and another 226 injured and missed time from work as a result of being hit by motor vehicles while working on the roads. That’s why the Work Zone Safety Alliance runs a Cone Zone campaign to encourage drivers to slow down and pay attention when driving through a cone zone.
In 2015, the BC government amended its Motor Vehicle Act Regulations under the Slow Down, Move Over legislation.
Prior to this, drivers knew they had to slow down when they saw lights flashing red and blue. In fact, seeing the blue and red would probably make them slow down quickly for fear of a speeding ticket.
But now a flashing amber light also means “slow down.” You’ll see the amber flashing on the vehicles of tow truck drivers, maintenance workers, utility workers, municipal workers, garbage collectors, and others at work on the road.
Speed limit in BC when lights flashing blue, red, or amber
* If the posted speed limit is equal to or greater than 80 km/h, drivers must slow to 70 km/h.
* If the posted speed is less than 80 km/h, drivers must slow to 40 km/h.
In both situations, drivers should be prepared move over and increase the space between their vehicle and the work zone, if it’s safe to do so.
But for some reason, many drivers still don’t do it. This shows we have a long way to go, so I’m glad to see folks like Lindsey speaking out.
