Driver glanced at GPS map moments before striking Parc Avenue jogger last year, coroner says
A driver unfamiliar with downtown Montreal was glancing at a GPS map on his cellphone when he fatally struck a 62-year-old jogger on Parc Avenue last year, according to a coroner's report.
The report concludes that the death of Concepción Cortacans was "avoidable," yet makes no recommendations about cellphone use by motorists.
Instead, coroner Stéphanie Gamache suggests that better signage indicating the pedestrian crossing on Parc Avenue facing the George-Étienne Cartier statue could help prevent future accidents there.
For Cortacans's widower, André Benyamin, the report fails to address a significant loophole that exists in the Quebec Highway Safety Code.
"Using a cellphone while driving is an offence, but using it as a GPS is not an offence," Benyamin told CBC News.
"That is contradictory and a bad regulation that we have in Quebec."
Since his wife's death, Benyamin has been calling for reckless motorists to face stiffer penalties.
The driver who struck his wife was given $1,000 fine for dangerous driving and four demerit points. Despite having run a red light, police determined he wasn't criminally at fault.
That was much too lenient, said Benyamin.
"I'm not looking for revenge," he added. "But if drivers are not warned and penalized for their bad actions, they are going to repeat their offence."
Driver was unfamiliar with Parc Avenue
Following the Jan. 7, 2016 collision, the driver told police that he didn't live in the downtown Montreal area, and that he had never driven on Parc Avenue before.
"He was going to a meeting and was using the GPS on his cellular telephone to navigate," the coroner's report reads.
"He would have had a moment's inattention and would not have noticed the red light."
The coroner's reports also explores several other dimensions of Cortacans' death, including a bus that Gamache said would have blocked the jogger's view of oncoming traffic.
Moving the bus stop to improve visibility, though, is ruled out because that would only put pedestrians and motorists at further risk.
Opposition frustrated with city inaction on Parc
Better signage, Gamache's report says, would warn drivers unfamiliar with the area of the presence of the pedestrian crossing.
On Monday, a spokesperson for Mayor Denis Coderre's administration said they were analyzing the coroner's findings and declined further comment.
The main opposition party at City Hall, Projet Montréal, expressed frustration with what the see as the city's persistent refusal to make Parc Avenue safer for pedestrians.
"The very least that the city could do is support our call for the installation of photo-radar technology on that stretch of Parc Avenue," said Alex Norris, Projet Montréal councillor for the Jeanne Mance district.
"Far too many people have been killed and very badly injured on Parc Avenue for far too many years."
