Mississauga may love their mayor, but those who share the road with her not so much, as the 93-year-old has been involved in a second car crash in a little over a month.
According to police and paramedics sources, it happened in late afternoon as the mayor was turning from Ontario St. onto Queen St. not far from her home in Streetsville on June 7.
It happened after Streetsville’s popular Bread and Honey Festival parade, which the mayor attended, when she collided with a Toyota near the Royal Canadian Legion branch.
Although MCallion may have had a run of bad luck as of late, data from the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety shows older drivers have low rates of police-reported crash involvements per capita.
However, their per capita fatal crash rates begin to increase at age 70.
“Per kilometre traveled, crash rates and fatal crash rates start increasing at about age 70,” according to the IIHS.
An officer described McCallion’s crash as “very minor” and said paramedics responded only as a precaution. But it has renewed calls from city councillors asking that McCallion hand her keys over to a driver.
“She should get a driver. This isn’t funny anymore. She’s got a few months left (in office) and she should get a driver,” Ward 11 councillor George Carlson told the Toronto Star. “When you keep running into things, this is serious. She should not be driving by herself.”
In her previous accident on May 2, McCallion was involved in a two-car collision at Wolfedale Rd. and Central Pkwy. around 6 p.m. (continued.)
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However, caution should be used when comparing crash rates per kilometre traveled of different age groups, says the IIHS.
“Older drivers generally travel fewer annual kilometres than most other age groups and, similar to low-mileage drivers of other ages, they tend to accumulate much of their mileage in city driving conditions,” says the IIHS. “In contrast, drivers who accumulate higher annual kilometres tend to do drive more freeways or divided multi-lane roads, which generally have much lower crash rates per kilometre traveled than other types of roads.”
And that means elevated crash rates for older drivers when measured per kilometre traveled may be somewhat inflated due to the type of driving they do.
Back in spring 2006, McCallion had been charged under the Highway Traffic Act with making an illegal right turn and was slapped with a $110 fine for crashing her car into a sign post at Britannia and McLaughlin Rds.
