Mississauga is looking to technology being used on the other side of the world in an effort to clamp down on noisy cars that dangerously race along city streets.

While Peel Regional Police regularly target illegal street racing — and cars with modified/excessively loud exhaust systems — through both routine patrols and specific enforcement campaigns, Mayor Carolyn Parrish said on Wednesday the City of Mississauga might be able to beef up its own enforcement when it comes to the illegal road activity.

“We get these guys with the (noisy) mufflers and the nonsense, and there are certain streets (in Mississauga) that are freeways, and they are racetracks…,” Parrish said at the city’s general committee meeting, adding that perhaps a high-tech enforcement tool already being used in Dubai, in the United Arab Emirates, to nab noisy and dangerous street racers might be of use in Mississauga.

She said there appears to be “a big problem” with noisy street racers in Dubai, where authorities are now using devices that record the loud vehicles and capture their licence plates.

In Dubai, where police say reckless vehicle modifications and excessive noise are on many occasions linked to dangerous driving, authorities are using AI-enabled noise-detection radar to catch vehicles that exceed legal sound limits, according to Wired Middle East.

The high-tech devices, which are mounted on roadside poles, measure noise intensity, identify the source (cars) of the sound and automatically record violations, a report earlier this year from Wired noted.

Georgios Fthenos, the City of Mississauga’s director of enforcement, says staff are familiar with the technology being used in Dubai.

Georgios Fthenos, the City of Mississauga’s director of enforcement, told Parrish staff are familiar with the technology being used in the UAE “and we are currently exploring if there’s an ability to regulate at the municipal level.”

Fthenos said once staff study the matter further, they’ll report back to city council on the “up-and-coming technology” and if it can be used in Mississauga.

Armed with a “zero tolerance” approach, Peel Regional Police regularly target street racing and noisy cars in Mississauga and Brampton through annual efforts such as Project Noisemaker and ERASE (Eliminating Racing Activities on Streets Everywhere).

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The illegal activity not only poses a threat to the safety of those behind the wheel of racing vehicles, but it endangers the lives of everyone on the road, police have said.

Typically, groups of street racers show up in large numbers to race in industrial areas in Peel and across the GTA late Friday and Saturday nights from about May to the end of October.


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