White triangles have appeared on the sidewalk of two streets in Quebec in recent weeks. These are dragon teeth. Far from biting, they are more aimed at improving road safety.
“It’s a test, it’s a first,” explains Pierre-Luc Lachance, vice-president of the Quebec City executive committee.
He explains that it is a marking on the ground that is intended to slow down vehicles.
The new concept will be tested on Avenue Notre-Dame in the airport district and on Saint-Félix Street in Cap-Rouge.
We really want to try these places. We will set up speed steles […]. We will have the data, then we can see what impact it has, adds Lachance.
Open in full screen mode
It is not yet known whether the “dragon’s teeth” will have any impact on drivers.
Photo: Radio-Canada / Bruno Giguere
Give the impression of a narrower track
Pierre-Luc Lachance explains that the successive triangles painted on both sides of the track are intended to give drivers the impression that the track is narrowing and therefore encourage them to slow down.
Similar regulations exist in Ontario and Australia. Authorities in Spain are in the testing phase and Dragon’s Teeth could one day spread to other European Union countries.
For Michèle St-Jacques, professor of civil engineering at the École de Technologie Supérieure (ÉTS), the concept deserves to be tested here: it is original because it does not cost too much to implement.
Open in full screen mode
New road markings on two streets in Quebec are designed to encourage road users to drive more slowly.
Photo: Radio-Canada / Bruno Giguere
The one who has studied road markings in more than a dozen countries believes that drivers should fundamentally understand that they should drive on the black part and not on the marked part.
But will it work? That remains to be seen, she adds.
Radio-Canada noted that many citizens locally and on Facebook have questioned the white triangles since they appeared.
When Radio-Canada visited the streets in question, many drivers entered the triangles without slowing down.
Photo radars to slow down
Michèle St-Jacques hopes that the dragon’s teeth will have an impact. However, she believes the real solution lies elsewhere.
“We recently conducted a study that showed that 85% of Quebecers support photo radars and that this percentage is even higher in school zones and near construction sites,” explains the professor.
This is perhaps the easiest way to get people to slow down, because if we test all these measures to make people slow down, we would have to resort to a more deterrent measure, she adds.