History
The Crosswalk Safety Society of Nova
Scotia (CSSNS) evolved from the Waverley Road Crosswalk Flags, a small
community group that initiated a project in 2008-09 to install crosswalk flags
at 13 locations along or near Waverley Road in Dartmouth, Nova Scotia.
Although well received by the public,
the Halifax Regional Municipality (HRM) Traffic Authority at the time was not supportive, effectively ending the
pilot program. We pushed forward, obtaining the approval of the Province of Nova Scotia
to allow crosswalk flags along provincial roads, the first being in 2011 at seven
locations in the Village of Port Williams. Subsequent installations occurred in Hubbards, Hantsport, Ayelsord, Berwick, New Ross, Bridgewater, Chester and Windsor, with a number of other communities installing crosswalk flags over the years.
After a recommendation from the
Halifax Regional Municipality's Crosswalk Safety Advisory Committee and support from municipal council, crosswalk
flags were finally again allowed in HRM in the summer of 2014. Through the Waverley Road Crosswalk Flag group crosswalk flags were reinstalled along Waverley Road and made available to other community groups. By year end there were 15 installations.
We have been extremely pleased with
the response. In 2015 another 56 crosswalk
flag locations were installed in HRM, demonstrating the public's desire
for additional tools to address crosswalk safety.
Due to the incredible response, our
small group decided to form the Crosswalk Safety Society of Nova
Scotia, registering the Society with the Registry of Joint Stocks. With the
creation of the Society, a Board now exists as well as separate
accounting. In 2016 the Society received charitable organization status from the Canada Revenue Agency, meaning we will issue charitable donation income tax receipts for any membership or contribution.
Installations continued strong in 2016 with another 70 installations. Regrettably HRM Council hit the pause button in May 2017, asking staff to review the program. As a result there were only 22 installations in 2017. In December 2017 the program was partially resurrected, although only allowing installations at 'basic' marked crosswalks (not at locations with RA5 infrastructure, in spite of evidence showing the greatest impact of crosswalk flags at these locations) and requiring the crosswalk posts to be within 1 metre of the marked crosswalk. As a result we saw only 18 installations in 2018 , 16 installations in 2019, and 9 installations in 2020.
Although there have been 204 installations to date, unfortunately 8 have been removed due to ongoing theft of the crosswalk flags, leaving 196 installations in HRM as of December 2020.