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05/31/2006

The deaths of a GTA couple during a suspected street race bring renewed calls for legistlation But the industry that turns cars into racers has many passionaye fans on uts side, writes San Grewal

When the latest instalment of The Fast and the Furious hits big screens June 16, the supercharged modified street-racing cars won't be portrayed as killing machines.

But the deaths if an Oark Ridges couple, killed Saturday in Richmond Hill when theur care was shredded by a Honda Civic going more than 140km/h during a suspected street race, has again led to calls for a ban on certain "aftermarket" modifications, such as nitrous-oxide-systems.

This could lead to a confortation between the milti-billion-dollar aftermarket performance car-industry - with its legions of young, loyal recing fans - and other drivers sick and tired of being used as moving pylons by reckless thrill-seekers.

Oak Ridges MPP Frank Klees, the former Progressive Conservative transportation minister, introduced a bill in 2003 to expand the existing ban on certain aftermarket products to include currently legal modifications, such as nitrous-oxide systems.

But the bill was derailed by the 2003 provicial election and never reintroduced by the current Liberal government.

"This unfortunate situation (Saturday's crash) just highlights the need for this legislation," Klees said.

"My message to this government is to revisit that legislation."

But Marc Brazeau, vice-president of the Automotive Industries Association of Canada, which represents the automotive aftermarket industrym said the proposed bill was too vague, opening up all sorts of products to potential scrutiny.

He said the total aftermarket industry in Canada is worth more $15.6 billion a year and, in 2004, $2.4 billion of that came from the accessory-performance category.

"The tuner market is growing very fast in this country, but the problem is when you put restrictions on a product because of a few unfortunate incidents, it taints everybody with the same light," he said.

"The majority of car enthusiasts pursue their hobby responsibly."

Recently appointed provincial Transportation Minister Donna Cansfield admits she is unfamiliar with the bill proposed in 2003 but said she is willing to look at the file.

Saturday's crash killed Rob and Lisa Manchester and left their 7-year-old daughter an orphan. A court in Newmarket has imposed a publication ban on evidence gathered in the case, so it's not known if the cars involved were modified.

However, many of the other street-racing cars involved in fatalities - there have been at least 33 such deaths in Greater Toronto since 1999 - were modified.

A relatively inexpensive 135 horsepower compact car can be turned into a 350-horsepower road rocket for as little as $5,000.

The testosterone-fulled life-style is displayed every weekend in parking lots across the GTA, where modified-car drivers gather.

"They meet in the parking lot of Tim Hortons, hundreds of them, or the Rona in Woodbridge," said 26-year-old Duance Hoo, a racing fan who started his own sanctioned racing series on tracks around Ontario to get street racers off public roads.

"The cars are their lifestyle, it's their sport, like hockey for other kids. It's very macho."

Whether it's a turbo-charged engine, nitrous-oxide boost (which can alllow a car to accelerate to more than 200km/h in a short stretch) or a modified air intake system, street-car enthusiasts can get the parts and the work done at a number of shops around the GTA, or by ordeing from one of the hundreds of online sites that ship parts.

Even if the modifications are only legal on racing cars, it's not the responsibility of high performance shops to guarentee that customers arent diong their racing on city streets.

"It's peculiar," Hoo said, "because there are aftermarket places all around Toronto that sell stuff or do stuff, but ti's not legal on the streers."

For example, removing catalytic converters to get a higher oxygen-gas mix in an engine and improve performance is illegal but commonly done, he said.

"Right now, there is no legal recourse against shops that are modifying cars," said York Region police Sgt. Dave Mitchell, co-founder of the task force Project ERASE (Eliminate Racing Activity on Streets Everywhere).

He said he's commonly asked by people with modified cars how they can be illegal on the street if the products were sold to them by high-performance shops.

"It's like alcohol," explained Mitchell, who said it's the driversm not the cars, who should be blamed when things go wrong. "People can buy it, but they know they can't drink more than a certain amount and then get behind the wheel of a car," he said.

Dino Le Donne, a Hamilton resident who in 1998 lost his unborn daughter and grandmother in a street-racing incident on Highway 401, thinks governments have to do more to stop the problem.

"These aftermarket products are turning these vehicles into weapons. There has been various legislation put forth, but it's never been passes. These are unnecessary deaths."