Police issued more tickets for stunt driving, street racing and other serious offences at two Mississauga hot spots during a recent enforcement campaign than anywhere else in the region.

Peel Regional Police officers visited Ridgeway Plaza (and nearby Auto Spa area) in the city’s west end 26 times to lay charges as part of their latest Project ERASE (Eliminating Racing Activities on Streets Everywhere) initiative, stats presented last week to the City of Mississauga’s Road Safety Committee show.

Ridgeway Plaza has regularly attracted headlines since opening in 2022 related to excessive late-night noise, street racing, parking concerns and other issues.

Police targeted specific areas in Mississauga and Brampton — the spots “that everybody’s been complaining about,” Peel police Const. Claudia D’Amico told committee members — during their most-recent Project ERASE campaign.

The enforcement initiative ran from May 1 through the end of August and also included Ontario Provincial Police as well as municipal law enforcement agencies in Toronto, Durham, Halton and Hamilton.

The Peel Regional Police numbers included enforcement action taken only in Mississauga and Brampton.

In addition to Ridgeway Plaza, police officers on the hunt for dangerous and illegal driving behaviour conducted enforcement on 22 occasions in the Financial Plaza area in north Meadowvale, information presented to the committee showed.

That part of the city is also known for illegal street racing and other dangerous driving, police have said.

Trinity Commons Mall in Brampton was next on the Project ERASE enforcement list in Peel, with 19 visits in which tickets and fines were handed out.

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Breaking down the enforcement numbers, police officers issued 38 provincial offence notices and 66 more serious Part III tickets to motorists at Ridgeway Plaza during the four-month campaign.

By comparison, 60 PONs and 30 Part III tickets were issued to alleged offenders at Financial Plaza and 12 PONs and 13 Part III tickets were handed out to motorists at Trinity Commons Mall in Brampton.

Project ERASE numbers across the various regions, including Peel, show:

657 Part III ticket notices were issued.
1,226 provincial offence notices were handed out.
868 vehicle stops were made.
157 stunt driving charges were laid.
98 noisemaker (loud mufflers) tickets were handed out.
144 vehicles were seized by police.
20 Criminal Code arrests were made.
91 Highway Traffic Act arrests were made.

D’Amico said although the latest Project ERASE campaign has been completed, police continue to target illegal driving hot spots in Mississauga and Brampton on Friday and Saturday nights throughout the year.

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 ERASE in addition to Project ERASE and Noisemaker combined campaigns.

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.

Numbers in Mississauga and Brampton from the latest Project ERASE campaign. (Source: Peel Regional Police)


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