Q: As cyclists aren’t licenced or insured, what happens if they’re in a collision with a car and found to be at fault? Are they charged the same as an unlicensed/uninsured car driver would be?
A: The provincial Highway Traffic Act not only covers motorists but also has rules pertaining to other road users including cyclists, pedestrians, persons riding animals, and even the person in charge of an animal-drawn or other non-motorized or toy vehicle (e.g. skateboard). None of these latter groups requires licensing or insurance to be on the roads.
As for fault, this is determined by insurance companies according to set rules. The role of police investigating a collision is to determine whether any offence has been committed and lay charges where appropriate. Whether any person is charged or convicted does not affect the fault determination.
A motorist involved in a collision where another motor vehicle driver, cyclist or other non-motorist is at-fault would recover damages from their own insurer under the “direct compensation — property damage” part of their own auto insurance policy. It would then be up to the insurer whether or not they want to attempt to recover funds from the other party.
If the motorist is determined to be at-fault, they may still opt to claim for property damage from their own insurer if they have collision coverage. However, a rate hike is likely to follow.
Pete Karageorgos, spokesperson for the Insurance Bureau of Canada, adds:
Since cyclists are not insured or licensed, if they are at-fault the motorist can claim against the cyclist’s property policy (i.e. home/tenants insurance). If the cyclist doesn’t have a property policy, then the motorist can sue the cyclist directly.
Sgt. Tim Burrows of Toronto Police Traffic Services adds:
Cyclists are not required under the HTA to be licensed nor under the Compulsory Automobile Insurance Act to be insured, so no charge can be laid in either regard as no offence has been committed. .
Q: My wife and I own a 1998 Honda Accord, 2.3 L, 4-cylinder, with 242,000 km, and a 1993 Honda Del Sol, 1.6 L, 4-cylinder, with 140,000 km. Both were purchased new and have been maintained as per the manufacturer’s maintenance schedules.
Comparing past Drive Clean tests, the emissions limits appear to have been lowered since 2002, but the actual results have steadily improved.
I would have expected the results to have deteriorated as the vehicles aged.
Is this normal or is it a misconception?
Is this unique to Honda or do most brands perform in a similar fashion?
A: Electrical engineer Eli Melnick of Start Auto Electric (startauto.com) in Toronto, who’s an independent expert on the technical aspects of emissions testing, replies:
Well maintained vehicles register results that are generally well below the limits. It is only when something is wrong with the on-board emissions control system that a vehicle exceeds these limits.
As for the variation in test results, exhaust emissions are highly dependent on the condition of components, such as oxygen sensors and catalytic converters. Their efficiency is extremely sensitive to operating temperature and that may explain the variance that your reader experienced. In most cases, a hotter catalytic converter is more effective at reducing tail-pipe gas readings.
Eric Lai adds:
According to Drive Clean, emissions test standards were tightened in January 2005. Additionally, the exemption for vehicles over 20 years old was phased out with 1987 being the last model-year excluded from testing. All 1988 or newer model-year vehicles will require e-tests in perpetuity to stay on the roads unless, of course, the Drive Clean program is cancelled.
You can send your non-mechanical questions to Eric Lai at wheels@thestar.ca. Include year, make, model and kilometres of autos cited, plus your name, address and telephone number. Personal replies cannot be handled due to volume.
Eric Lai, TORONTO STAR, Jul 02, 2010
Some more of our worst driving offences
August 12th, 2010Re: 10 worst motoring offencesIan Law, June 26
I was hoping you would have stressed “failure to signal” far more (maybe even have ranked it higher than no. 7).
1. Signalling is not for the driver – signal even when you think you are alone;
2. Signalling should preclude any use of brakes (other than straight ahead);
3. Signalling should be done to indicate moving into or out of a parking space, etc.;
4. The left signal is also used by big slower vehicles (trucks) to tell following cars it is safe to pass on winding roads.
Don McKee, Oakville
I would like to add to Ian Law’s list of the 10 worst things drivers do: Cutting corners.
We live in a suburban area with few sidewalks. As a driver and even more as a pedestrian, I have to be on the lookout for drivers who begin their turns way back from the intersection.
Some even seem to believe they live in a left-hand-drive jurisdiction because, having turned the corner on the wrong side, they carry on driving for some distance in the left lane. Frightening.
Frank Jones, Toronto
I couldn’t agree more with Ian Law’s list.
I think it’s particularly noteworthy that speeding didn’t make the list. But Ian is avoiding the elephant in the room (on the road?) – namely, the police or more specifically the OPP.
They may agree with offence No. 1 (impaired driving) but No. 2 would clearly be speeding with all other offences being relegated to second-tier status.
Offence No. 5 (left-lane driving) and No. 6 (driving in the middle lane) wouldn’t make the list since the police actually condone those poor driving practices, and in fact are frequently guilty of those offences themselves.
Section 147 of the Highway Traffic Act couldn’t be more clear: “Any vehicle travelling upon a roadway at less than the normal speed of traffic . . . shall be driven in the right-hand lane then available for traffic.”
The police incorrectly interpret “normal speed of traffic” to be the posted speed limit. The normal speed of traffic is usually well above the posted speed limit and therefore the law is rarely enforced.
Until the police obsession with speeding is addressed, there is no point in criticizing those of the driving public who are just following the police interpretation of the law, as misguided as it might be.
Peter Marie, Burlington
Re: Car exhibit not afraid to be Canadian John LeBlanc, June 26
John LeBlanc’s statement that “like the LeMoyne and Rideau models, the Montcalm was a rebadged U.S. Meteor, produced and sold in Canada until 1961,” is inaccurate. The Montcalm was basically a rebadged Ford Galaxie, not a Meteor, just as the Rideau name was a rebadged Fairlane.
The Meteor was a Ford-based car conceived in Canada, along with a Mercury-based car called the Monarch. The Meteor was sold through Canadian Lincoln-Mercury dealers to give them a broader range of cars. Similarly, the Monarch was sold through Ford dealers for the same reason.
The Monarch was sold from 1949 until 1961. The name would reappear in 1977 as the Mercury version of the Ford Granada, but this Monarch was nothing like the Canadian version of the 1950s! The Meteor itself was nothing more than a Ford with a Mercury grill and appropriate badging.
When Ford in the U.S. came up with the Fairlane name in 1955, Ford of Canada came up with the Rideau name for the Meteor. Then, with the release of the Galaxie name in 1959, came the Montcalm.
In 1961, there was some confusion, particularly near the border, as Mercury in the U.S. released two low-line trim levels for the standard U.S. Mercury called the ‘Meteor 600’ and the ‘Meteor 800’. These were just that, trim levels.
The Meteor ceased being a rebadged Ford in 1962 when Ford dropped the Fairlane model down to the mid-sized level (it had been a trim-level on the standard-sized Ford until 1961), and Mercury adopted the name Meteor for its version of the car. However, the Meteor was dropped after the 1963 model year.
In 1964, the Meteor returned to being exclusively Canadian, being based on the then-1964 Mercury. In the late-’60s, Mercury split its large-car line into two separate lines, the Monterey and the Marquis.
The Monterey was not sold directly in Canada. Instead, this model became the new Meteor, and continued to sell until the Meteor model was dropped after the 1978 model year. It actually spent its last year (1979) as the base trim level of the Mercury Marquis before disappearing forever.
My fondest memory of the Meteor was my 1971 Rideau 500. I bought it in late 1977, and drove it for almost four years. I ran the mileage up from approximately 78,000 when I bought it to 150,000 when I sold it.
The car was massive by today’s standard, and would rival any modern SUV for its size, but was nice riding, and was surprisingly economical to operate, as well as being the most reliable car I ever owned.
Unfortunately, from the sublime to the ridiculous, I replaced it with a car that would turn out to become the most unreliable car I ever owned, and for at least two years, every time I saw the guy who bought that Meteor from me, I regretted ever selling it!
Was it a coincidence that that Meteor was so reliable, and it was built in Oakville, Ontario? I think not! By the way, I still miss that car!
Ken Zoskey, Hamilton
The first couple of times I read Jeremy Clarkson’s unintentionally satiric self-portrait of a fifth-rate jerk, I was mildly amused. Now his rants have become merely tedious.
Drop him, he’s a waste of space. Use it for something useful, such as the effect of different tires on road noise.
Wolf Kirchmeir, Blind River
Write to wheels@thestar.ca, or mail to Your View, Wheels, Toronto Star, One Yonge St. Toronto, Ont. M5E 1E6. Include full name, address and phone number. Letters may be edited for length.
TORONTO STAR, Jul 02, 2010
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