Ask Torontoist: Can Construction Workers Stop Traffic?

By Stephen Michalowicz

Ask Torontoist features questions posed by you and answered by our elite team of specially trained investigative experts (also known as our staff). Send your questions to [email protected].

Reader Christopher Vriend asks:

Do construction workers, in the absence of a police officer, have the right to stop traffic? At sites downtown, on York [Street] for example, I often see a flagman go into traffic to stop traffic so that a truck can more easily enter or exit the site—during rush hour or at any other time of day.

Photo by Marc Lippe from the Torontoist Flickr Pool.

Torontoist answers:

Yes. In Ontario, construction workers can stop and direct traffic without police assistance.
According to Jacqueline White, manager of traffic operations for the City of Toronto’s Transportation Services, construction workers, under the Ontario Occupational Health and Safety Act, “are allowed to direct traffic for one lane in the same direction.” To manage traffic, workers must have received “adequate written and oral instructions”; they must be “competent”; they must possess the proper safety equipment; and they cannot “perform any other work while directing vehicular traffic.” It doesn’t matter if the construction crew is repairing a road, building a house, or fixing a sewer main; if they have the permits and meet proper requirements, they can direct traffic.
Companies often hire a paid duty police officer to manage traffic, but they’re only essential when traffic signals (stop signs, traffic lights) are disrupted; when pedestrians and motorists share a conflicting space; or when it’s necessary for a single person to direct multiple lanes of traffic, or traffic in different directions.