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Originally Posted by jhausner
I don't actually think Option C is horrible. It is expensive though and doesn't really have long term benefits.
I think the biggest issue with New West is they don't really want any truck traffic despite the fact that they sit between 2 major industrial areas so they can't avoid it at all. They would be better off just embracing that corridor as a transport corridor and go with the best option for moving stuff QUICKLY through their city which seems to be Option A.
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Options A and B keep truck traffic on Brunette. Option C would divert it through the existing industrial zone and away from Brunette (and the hospital).
New West (and Metro Vancouver) also have in their long-term goals a goods movement tunnel through New West (presumably to replace Front Street). Option C's tunnel would be able to connect to that in the distant future.
New Westminster will never go for Option A, because it not only involves bulldozing houses, it also involves the radical transformation of lower Sapperton, turning Rousseau Street into a fairly major thoroughfare. At last night's council meeting, city staff presented some traffic forecasts for Rousseau (which I believe they got from MoTI): Rousseau currently gets 75 cars per hour in the afternoon/evening rush. Option A would increase that to 1500. I can't see how anybody would think New Westminster would want that option.
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We'll see I guess. I just really dislike the interface with HWY1 for both Options A and B. I think it is extremely confusing and would lead to some awkward access to the various streets. Also, in my experience, one of the biggest bottle necks is at Braid street and only Option A remove that entirely. Heck I had to go not far from Ikea just last Saturday. It was 12 noon on a weekend, and it took me longer to get through the braid intersection than it did to get there from Surrey Central over the Patullo bridge. There was actually a point where a train was going by and all the traffic directions were red lighted for 4 minutes (I counted). Made absolutely no sense. I was sitting there thinking "Why can't we move over the overpass? Why is our light red with a train going parallel? This is stupidly designed."
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With Option C you wouldn't even go on Brunette at all, you'd take the tunnel to the new Blue Mountain connector and get to IKEA that way.