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This week brought news of three pedestrian or cyclist fatalities on the streets of Toronto — a spate that has former chief city planner Jennifer Keesmaat calling for a “state of emergency.” “It’s too much to take. It’s unbearable,” she tweeted, calling for an immediate lowering of speed limits as a first “basic” step.

Keesmaat noted that the annual pedestrian death toll — 30, on average, since 2007 — is comparable to the 2003 SARS outbreak happening every single year. An average of 183 other pedestrians have been seriously injured each year, along with 50 cyclists. And 29 cyclists have perished over that decade, according to police statistics.

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But if we should now be in a state of emergency, we should have been in one for a long time. We are not on pace for a record year — more like an average one. The number of cyclist deaths is stable — between one and four every year — and serious non-fatal injuries are about as common as they were a decade ago, despite many more people cycling. The rate of pedestrians killed is on the rise, but the number seriously injured is on a definite downward trend.

So it’s not all terrible news, relatively speaking. But other reasonably comparable North American cities do far better — notably Seattle, where the pedestrian fatality rate is roughly half Toronto’s. And most activities have gotten far safer over the years. Driving certainly has. It seems like a distinct failure of social progress that crossing the street hasn’t.

The issue reduces many Torontonians to righteous apoplexy. Implore pedestrians and cyclists to be more careful out there, as TSN basketball analyst Leo Rautins did on Twitter this week, and you will be deluged with allegations of victim blaming, callousness and general idiocy.