Roadway line-painting — on the cheap

Opinion

Hey there, time traveller!
This article was published 25/06/2024 (468 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

Road lines and cars have a unique relationship, because those white and yellow lines have been making driving safer since the 1900s.

The first road lines were introduced to help reduce a brand-new roadway occurrence: motor vehicle collisions caused by higher speeds and a need for faster decision-making by drivers.

Lines are still critical.

Road lines are crucial information for drivers, allowing them to landmark their position on the pavement — especially at night.

There’s research that shows how vital those lines can be — the introduction of a white line on the edge of roadways is credited with a 23 per cent reduction in the number of motor vehicle accidents, for example.

On multi-lane streets, the lines help vehicles maintain a safe distance from the cars next to them, preventing collisions, and aid drivers in recognizing dedicated turning lanes. Lines provide clear instructions to drivers and allow those drivers to make quick and safe decisions. They keep traffic moving smoothly, limiting delays as drivers navigate to work, home and everywhere else.

But don’t take our word for that. Here’s what the City of Winnipeg has to say about road lines on its website: “The City of Winnipeg roadways are designed to be safe, and road markings are an important, but often overlooked, safety feature. Painted lines keep traffic in lanes and serve as guide posts for passing, safety, crosswalks and stopping areas.”

“Overlooked” is a good way to put it.

Right now, we’re on the very cusp of July, and many of Winnipeg’s major routes have been just that — overlooked — when it comes to line painting. Last week, when the Free Press started looking into the strange absence of road lines in the city, McPhillips was just one of the streets that was bare. At night, lanes on that street were a matter of pure guesswork.

Other streets in the city are equally line-less.

At the time, the city’s only street-lining vehicle, now 16 years old and prone to frequent breakdowns, was out of commission. Road marking had been further delays by wet weather, and the six-month effort to line all of the 1,000 kilometres of Winnipeg roads was behind schedule.

Wait — was that one line-paint vehicle, that, if it was a student, would be old enough to be well into high school? You heard that right.

Now think about this: the “important, but often overlooked safety feature” of painting road lines currently has a budget of $178,000 a year — for everything. That’s labour, equipment and materials. (For comparison purposes, the city’s draft 2024 budget was $1.36 billion, roughly 7,640 times the entire line-painting budget.)

Since we’re considering numbers, here’s another one. Direct costs from a single simple motor vehicle collision without injuries in 2018, according to a study of Edmonton accidents, was around $14,000 per collision. (Given inflation and a marked increase in repair costs, it’s probably considerably higher now.)

If comprehensive and prompt line painting stopped just 13 minor examples of Winnipeg’s 14,500 or so accidents (2021 numbers), the overall savings to drivers and insurers would be equal to doubling the entire road-lining budget.

To recap: road lines are not optional. They are a relatively inexpensive way to prevent extremely expensive accidents — oh, and even to protect lives.

Right now, city staff have even suggested that it’s a reasonable alternative that some road lines might not painted this year because of the weather delays and faulty equipment.

Well, you wouldn’t recommend driving on bald tires was a good idea because there wasn’t the time or money to get a new set. Or that it would just be fine to drive without brakes until next spring.

Invest in what’s needed to paint the lines.