Good morning, Oak Bay. Somebody did 114 on Beach Drive. Tickets there are down 63%. Sgt. Steven Twardy spent the afternoon of Sept. 1 on the shoulder with a laser gun, and he has a theory about how 114 in a 40 happens: muscle car, ten minutes of winding roads, then the long straight past the golf club and the foot just goes. I get it. Back when Teslas were still a novelty, a friend used Beach Drive to show me what zero to 60 felt like. It was awesome. Then I saw the other number. 46. That's every speeding ticket and warning written on Beach Drive this year. By this point last year, 123. So either Oak Bay slowed down, or fewer people got caught, and the police report doesn't say which. Also in here: the rec centre waterslides are shut with no date, a 10-year-old from the golf club is off to Northern Ireland, and the chip bags under your sink can finally leave the house. The Oak Bay Local team |
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Beach Drive speeds The laser on Beach Drive reads your speed from 500 metres away Sgt. Steven Twardy's lidar isn't radar. It's a fine laser, accurate enough to single out one car in traffic. Beach Drive gives him plenty to look at. It runs 10 kilometres along the water from the corner of Dallas and Foul Bay, past the Victoria Golf Club and Glenlyon Norfolk School, and the district says its open design encourages speed. "Sometimes, it's people just playing," Twardy said. "They've got a muscle car, they've been stuck doing winding roads for the last 10 minutes, and they see this straight stretch, and they just take advantage of it." Seven drivers were ticketed for excessive speeding this year, meaning more than 40 over the limit. Those seven averaged 93 km/h. The top was 114. Last year's top was a motorcyclist at 145. Twardy was out at 3:30 in the afternoon. The three stops police put out a release about this year all came after dark. April 18, 10:15 p.m., 87 km/h. May 27, 10:30 p.m., 89, on a learner's licence with nobody in the passenger seat. July 6, late evening, 88. All three in the 900-block. If there's a pattern on Beach Drive, it's the same stretch, after ten at night. A regular ticket is $196, or $138 if you pay within 30 days. Excessive speeding is $368 and seven days without your vehicle. Sixty over is $483. Dozens of cyclists ride the road every day, golfers cross it between holes, and students walk it to school. Police point to research that a pedestrian hit at 30 km/h survives nine times in ten. At 50 km/h, four in five die. "This is a residential area," Twardy said. "We're out here trying to remind drivers to monitor their speeds and keep everybody safe." 46 Speeding tickets and warnings on Beach Drive from Jan. 1 to Aug. 27 this year. The same stretch of 2025 produced 123, and 2024 produced 82. |
Sources · Oak Bay News · Victoria News · Saanich News · CHEK News |
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Community Bulletin Board What's pinned up around the village |
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Posters from around Oak Bay. Tap any to open the source. |
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Recycling Expansion to Oak Bay You can finally drop chip bags and foam trays at Oak Bay High  Photo · Architectsea, CC BY-SA 4.0 |
Foam meat trays, chip bags, dead phone chargers, spent batteries and burnt-out bulbs don't belong in the blue box, and all of it can now go to a year-round depot in the Oak Bay High parking lot, at Cadboro Bay Road and Cranmore, a short walk from the rec centre. The Capital Regional District calls the program Beyond the Curb. It announced the Oak Bay hub on Tuesday, along with a second at the Westhills Bus Exchange in Langford. Both copy the Colwood Park and Ride depot that opened in May 2025. Hours are Saturday and Sunday, 9 a.m. to 4 p.m., every weekend of the year. Bring flexible plastics, foam packaging, cardboard, paper, mixed containers, glass jars, household batteries, light bulbs and electronics, meaning laptops, keyboards, remotes, battery-powered toys and anything with a cord. Beverage containers are taken for donation only. Nobody hands out deposit refunds on site. The CRD says it puts hubs near rec centres, bus routes and bike routes so people can walk their recycling over instead of driving it across the region. Sources · Times Colonist · Victoria Buzz |
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| 🗳️ | October's election is filling in. Coun. Cairine Green is running for a third term, with housing under Bill 44 (664 new units by 2028) at the top of her list. Andrea Mears, an Oak Bay parent and labour negotiator, is running for the new Oak Bay seat on the school board. [Oak Bay News] |
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From the Oak Bay Local group A few things your neighbours shared |
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"Dancing in the Blue Hour," 8x10 oil on canvas, the fourth in his Night Lights series. |
A student's drawing of the forest school stump circle. |
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That's the week. Which Oak Bay street do drivers treat like the Malahat? Hit reply and tell us. Have a good weekend, and drive like your neighbours are watching. The Oak Bay Local team |
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