As the unofficial start of summer rapidly approaches, I am again met with a sense of caution and dreadful anticipation.
While the Victoria Day weekend means the start of barbeques, road trips and many kinds of outdoor fun, it has not always been kind to local drivers, and their families.
It has been nearly 20 years since the Quinte Region was at the tragic centre of road safety conversations, but the memory is as clear as if it were yesterday.
There were a total of five fatal crashes in the entire province of Ontario on the Victoria Day weekend in 2008. All of them were in the greater Quinte Region.
The one that most people will remember is a collision where three young people lost their lives in a crash between a car and a big rig on County Road 25 south of Warkworth.
There were also fatal crashes in the Centre Hastings, Prince Edward County and Napanee areas that weekend. More than half a dozen families spent that summer and all the ones that followed dealing with grief and loss and cookouts with empty chairs around the fire.
My birthday is this holiday weekend, as it is about three of every seven years depending on how the days fall on the calendar, and there is one simple present that I humbly ask from you and everyone hitting the road over the next three days.
Please be careful, put down your phone, celebrate responsibly, and look out for each other. Let’s make the summer of 2026 one to remember, and not for the reasons I still remember this weekend in 2008.
I’m Paul Martin and that’s what I see looking Beyond the Headlines.
