I used this as the title because the city uses the term.
I read this article today which made me think of a bunch of recent initiatives by the city's traffic committee.
http://vocm.com/news/drivers-none-to...-restrictions/
St. John's is becoming increasingly congested it seems; not sure why, or if it's reality or just my perception. We live in a city in which the older section's roads are built on former cart paths, and frequently these "cart paths" are the only direct routes into or out of the downtown core.
Which brings me to my point:
The city has recently (due to concerns of residents they state), started hindering these routes all over the city, with so called "traffic calming" ideas and devices. I say hindering, because in this city which lacks sufficient modern wide avenues to reach adjoining sections; the traffic calming initiatives usually just serve to appease the noisy few on a particular street.
This serves to shunt the traffic load to a neighbouring street (are their kids any less deserving of safety?), and also serve to bottleneck the traffic, as it is funneled into routes less "hindered".
A perfect recent example is of course, Old Topsail Road (there are numerous others).
There were quite a few vocal residents of that street (some prominent local activists), who managed to sway council to implement a bunch of ridiculous (IMHO), measures to that route. Did it work? It sure did! It shunted the traffic flow doubly onto Craigmillar Ave., a street that is argueably less suited to it (no off street parking), and has significant twists and turns! Again, are their kids no less deserving of safety?
So where does it stop? If Craigmillar residents asked and received the same treatment, 2 direct routes to downtown from the West end are now bottle necked. Then Hamilton Ave. folks get upset, and so on ..... you see my point.
I started this post after reading the above headline, which I will readily admit may be necessary (eliminate a left turn across 2 lanes of traffic with no lights), but it got me thinking about how many of the city's traffic decisions are "knee jerk" solutions!
Speaking of "left turn across 2 lanes of traffic"; the one that blows me away is the,
still legal left turn from Columbus Drive onto Empire Ave. W., across 2 lanes of traffic doing more than 80km/hr and coming over the rise of a hill. I wrote Doc O'Keefe about this maybe 10 years ago, and he was gonna "look into it".
Sorry for the long post !!!