Safety Equipment

No one does traffic safety videos quite like the Australians. In this 30 second television ad you learn the value of wearing a seatbelt. Like it says at the end, no belt, no brain!

We could soon see white strobe lights mounted on the roof of school buses in B.C. Standards allow for a white strobe to be mounted on the center of the roof on the rear third of the vehicle. It is meant to provide increased visibility and may be operated in fog or when the bus is stationary.

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Courtesy of YouTube and the Discovery Channel, this video highlights ABS, Traction Control and Electronic Stability Control and their ability to help you maintain control of your vehicle on ice. They are vehicle options that you should not be without as the two automakers identified in the video estimate that ESC alone can reduce your chances of collision from 30 to 50%.

I am often asked why school buses are manufactured without seatbelts. We are all accustomed to using them in our cars and know that they are a significant factor in reducing injury or death in a collision. If this is the case, shouldn't our children have the same benefit when they are bused to and from school?

Commercial Vehicle Safety and Enforcement has received numerous complaints and enquiries regarding vehicles operating on the highway without the driver and / or passenger door(s) in place. Reports most commonly identify certain makes and models of Jeep as some of these vehicles have side doors that may be easily removed. Any vehicle operating on the highway without doors represents a serious safety concern for the occupants as side intrusion protection and passenger containment would be compromised in the event of a collision.

When I was young, we thought nothing of throwing a mattress in the back of the station wagon, loading up my brother and sisters and heading off on holidays. We would sprawl on that mattress reading comic books or playing games. Sometimes we even fought over whose turn it was to be in the back.

Is it illegal to fail to replace an airbag in a rebuilt car? My car has dual front airbags, and after a major collision they did not deploy.

Is there a difference between the helmet laws which make it law to wear a helmet on a bicycle,and the wearing of one on a motorcycle? The reason I ask is that I ride both a motorcycle and a bicycle.

As with everything else in our lives, the cost of not wearing a seatbelt is going up again. On April 18th the "bill" will $138 instead of $109. Of course, there will still be the $25 discount for early payment, but $113 is a lot of money to have to part with!

One would think that wearing a seatbelt would be an automatic habit for today's drivers and their passengers. The seatbelt law has been in place for many years and the benefits of being properly buckled up have been clearly demonstrated.