So according to your argument,a saftey feature luls a driver into a false sense of security.... so we should do away with ABS, Airbags, Side impact bars, etc etc, As to the expense, what expense ?
Iain buys a new car, and oreders with a 2nd set of rims and winter tires.
Iain expects Ca. 50,000km life out of his tires, he has two sets ergo 100,000km, the same milage as if he had bought two summer sets.
At 150000km Iain wishes to sell his car, he sell it to a young couple that cant afford a new vehicle,at the market value plus a % more for the second set of wheels and tires..
Now this may sound pie in the sky maths to you guys, but its true and works daily in Switzerland,, when buying a second hand car, one of the first features looked at is whether the car has 8 wheels and tires,beleive me ive bought 3 second hand cars there.

Think of Switzerland. What do you picture? Mountains, snow, young men in lederhosen.

Think of the GTA. What do you picture? Flatness, concrete, murals of cowboys holding hands.

There's a big difference and it is that, in Switzerland, there's a lot of winter and so a case for winter tyres. In the GTA there is neither.

Even so, in my phase of shipping grey market Jeeps to Switzerland we never thought about winter tyres and no one asked for them so it's not the case that all vehicles have winter tyres.

Your maths makes no sense at all in terms of introducing a snow tire law because 2 million car owners are not going to go out and buy a new car with extra rims, they will have to go out now and buy a new set of tires, perhaps two or more (multiple vehicles, kids cars etc). With real cash money.

Im not saying that over time they wont pay for themselves, I think they do, but people would still have to front up for them now if a law was introduced, and many people simply dont have the money.

Its basically a tax on the poor, because I suspect that those with the money to spend are more likely to be the ones with a set of blizzaks already.

And until I see some independent trials detailing braking performance on dry roads at varying temperatures, its extremely hard to make a convincing argument that winter tires would make such a difference in the GTA environment that it is clearly worth mandating their use. I have looked and never found that data.

I live more rural, and encounter snowy and icy roads more frequently, so for me its worth it, but Im not going to push that on millions who live in the city and drive on snowy icy roads for maybe 20hrs total a year.

Whats a grey market jeep
And why would a Swiss expect that a brit had access or would even know what winter tires and rims where, they probably bought them separate in CH

would snow tyres have stopped this???

A new Jeep purchased from a dealer in one country, in this case Canada, for immediate resale in another country, in this case Switzerland.

I shipped the Jeeps to my brother-in-law, a Swiss living in Switzerland, who sold them. At his request, I filled them with spare tyres, unmounted, and even put tyres on the roof rack. This due to the difference in tyre prices between the two countries. I sent ordinary tyres to match those supplied by the manufacturer. Nothing was said about winter tyres over the course of two years or so and a couple of dozen Jeeps.

Not that this has much bearing on the need for winter tyres in the GTA.

Snow tires might have caused it....If it had them and the car behind didnt

It depends how fast the vehicle was reversing and on what surface.

To be fair it seems that there are very few winter tires on the market for trucks / SUVs. The expectation seems to be that the chunky off road lug design of many light truck tires is enough to deal with snow. The Goodyear Fortera is the only light truck tire I know of that is snow and ice rated...and its an all season year round use product....


I expect gremmie will correct me if Im wrong as he seems to know about this.

I,m not an experrt just very passionate on the subject...

Youre argument about multi car families, applies these days to most countries not just here, or GTA.. And if some one can afford a car,and pay for its upkeep, then if the law demanded winter tires then that should be paid for,,, we pay for all the other saftey devices that are built into the vehicles.

Don't French autoroutes have dual limits? ISTR two signs, one "regular" speed limit of 130k and one on a sign with a picture of raindrops posting a 110k limit for poor weather conditions. I never noticed any difference at all in driving behaviour in France between wet and dry conditions, which seems to bear out CH's and dbd's concerns with this approach...

Well i for one will be using winter tyres and at least i know i will have done everything i can as well as driving according to the conditions,
Will also go on a course been reading about on handling the car in the ice and snow,


Now what car shall i get ?

Yes. There's a school of thought that that is exactly what we should do. I forget where I saw it, but there was a not-completely-tongue-in-cheek suggestion a while back that the single biggest safety feature in a car would be a bloody great spike sticking out of the steering wheel boss. The possibility of being impaled if you drove into anything, the theory goes, would concentrate the minds of drivers and ensure they were always able to stop within a safe distance.

OK, that's deliberately over the top, but the thought behind it is that all the passive safety features in cars do indeed lull drivers into a false sense of invincibility which encourages them to drive beyond their or their vehicle's ability to deal with the road conditions.

Repeating myself...until I see some independent trials detailing braking performance on dry roads at varying temperatures, its extremely hard to make a convincing argument that winter tires would make such a difference in the GTA environment that it is clearly worth mandating their use. I have looked and never found that data.

Anyone who has been visiting this forum for a while will probably know I am a strong advocate of using winter tires...I wrote most of the wiki on the subject (and block heaters too) But I havent seen any evidence that mandating them on every car in Ontario is justified.

If there is a clear benefit, and it can be implemented without impacting those who can least afford it, then sure, Id back it, but I dont think in Ontario, at least the southern part where everyone lives, that there is data to support an argument that its worth it.

I wonder what the end result in Quebec will be, where its that much colder and snowier. Will there be fewer accidents and deaths?