One-day OPP crackdown on Hwy 17

OPP NEWS RELEASE

************************* Operation Corridor province-wide initiative focuses on commercial vehicles

ORILLIA, ON, Sept. 13 - The Ontario Provincial Police (OPP), Ministry of Transportation (MTO) and the Ministry of the Environment are working together in a 24-hour province-wide initiative targeting aggressive commercial truck drivers. The campaign begins at 6 a.m. today along Highway 401 from Windsor to the Quebec border and on Highway 11/17 in Northern Ontario.

The OPP will use aircraft surveillance to support its personnel and resources on the ground. Operation Corridor is an annual border-to-border highway safety initiative that focuses on high visibility, enforcement and education opportunities on major highways.

It is part of the OPP's Provincial Traffic Safety Program. "The OPP is committed to reducing fatalities, serious injuries and extended traffic jams following collisions on our highways," OPP Commissioner Julian Fantino said. "Because of their significant potential for serious injuries and death, we are working with our safety partners in an effort to lower speeds, reduce aggressive driving and to ensure trucks are mechanically fit. Commercial vehicle drivers who demonstrate a lack of respect for the fundamental rules of the road compromise their own safety as well as that of other motorists." "As we have on past long weekends, our enforcement will include the use of a rented aircraft," OPP Chief Superintendent Bill Grodzinski, Commander of the Highway Safety Division, said. "By including air surveillance we will be able to cover larger sections of the highway. It will also give us the opportunity to identify commercial drivers who speed or are driving aggressively. We have found aircraft traffic enforcement to be very effective." While the OPP will concentrate on commercial vehicle speed and moving violation safety, MTO and Ministry of the Environment inspectors will continue to check commercial vehicles to identify unsafe units and those not meeting emission standards and, if appropriate, take them off the road.

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