[MonctonRad]

And one final thing before I go to bed......

Pedestrian crossing in works

Thursday, February 16, 2012
Times & Transcript

By: Brent Mazerolle
Moncton wants to link Salisbury Road, Main Street over causeway traffic circle

There's good news for Salisbury Road-area residents who sometimes feel they are cut off from the rest of Moncton by the decidedly pedestrian-unfriendly causeway traffic circle. The city is taking a step forward in helping pedestrians and cyclists navigate the twin hazards of the traffic circle and the main transcontinental rail line that crosses it.

City council has approved the awarding of a contract to Crandall Engineering that will see the company come up with three separate conceptual designs for a pair of pedestrian/ bicycle bridges to safely link Salisbury Road and Main Street, most likely via the western head of the Riverfront Trail and the branch trail that leads cyclists and walkers to their own dedicated railroad crossing at the foot of Milner Road.

The design contract, worth about $70,000, will also require Crandall Engineering to take on some of the negotiations with CN to cross parts of land they own. As well, the provincial Department of Transportation owns some of the land in question.

The idea being considered involves two prefabricated bridges being installed, but how exactly it will all be configured is what the successful bidder will have to devise.

The connectivity project dovetails nicely with the city's recently completed Active Transportation plan, but it has something the city has been working on and talking to CN about for years.

It's perhaps no surprise, then, that veteran councillors Merrill Henderson and Kathryn Barnes moved and seconded the motion, which passed unanimously with all councillors in attendance at their last meeting.

Said Barnes, 'I'd almost given up hope this was ever going to happen, but I'm really pleased to see it here (on the council's agenda).' Under questioning from Henderson, the city's general manager of engineering, Jack MacDonald, discussed the state of negotiations with CN.

'We have a sort of agreement in principle,' MacDonald said, saying Henderson's comments about the negotiations with the railway being stretched out over years was accurate.

'Our first kick at this was to use where the second track had been abandoned (by the railway, which removed one track from its railbed through the city). But CN said, 'you're still too close to an operating track.'' Whatever the final design, the bridges will stand separate and independent of the railbed.

There's no immediate word on when the project will jump from the drawing board to the road way and railway.

And for any of the T&T reporters out there who see this (and we know you read this forum), I did not appropriate this article from the TelegraphJournal.com website. I found it (freely available) at a different site on the web. So there.....