As promised last week by Williams Lake RCMP Insp. Jeff Pelley during a report to city council, police will be revving up and conducting road checks in an effort to make area roads safer.
Insp. Pelley told council during its regular meeting Tuesday there is a priority in the Williams Lake area to target impaired drivers.
There was a 31 per cent decrease in impaired driving charges in 2017 compared to 2016, but then that could have been attributed to less road checks.
“Each watch member will conduct a road check above their regular duties,” Pelley said, noting people can expect to see the number of road checks increase by 39 per cent.
On Thursday, March 8, the Williams Lake Traffic Services, Cariboo Chilcotin Traffic Services from Quesnel, and Prince George Regional Traffic Services, partnered with Commercial Vehicle Safety Enforcement officers and set up a road check on Highway 97.
“During the time spent at the road check, police issued over 50 violation charges as well as over 140 notice and orders for various vehicle defects,” said Cpl. Madonna Saunderson, North District media relations.
More than 220 commercial vehicles were checked for compliance and of those, four were put out of service for a variety of reasons and some were issued violation charges, she added.
A second initiative by the Williams Lake RCMP, Pelley said will be to reduce the number of collisions by focusing on things such as distracted driving.
“Our collisions had a two per cent increase in 2017,” he told council. “There were 222 collisions in 2017 and 217 the year before.”
In the first two months of 2018, however, collisions have decreased. There were 55 in the first two months of 2017 and so far in 2018, there were 55.
“We want to assess if there are areas that are impacted by signage or turns. We want to look at the engineering aspects and engage with stakeholders,” Pelley said.
Additionally, the police will look at what is called “interdiction,” which is when they look beyond the motor vehicle act to ensure offenders aren’t coming into the community to supply drugs or using the highway corridor as a “pipeline” for transporting drugs.
“We want to mesh this into our uniform duties as well as a crime-reduction unit’s duties,” Pelley said.
