Bayers Road Widening and bus lanes?

[someone123]

Interesting:

Council ponders widening Bayers Road to eliminate 'choke point' for buses

By AMY PUGSLEY FRASER City Hall Reporter
Wed. Apr 16 - 5:52 AM

City hall is looking at widening Bayers Road soon to accommodate a buses-only lane, Halifax regional council heard Tuesday.

Metro Transit buses often idle there for at least 15 minutes in rush-hour traffic, and the street is an important part of the flow of traffic toward the main on-ramp to the Bicentennial and Bedford highways.

A staff report on the project says the Bayers Road "choke point" is costing Metro Transit an estimated $370,000 per year.

A homeowner on the street said she was very surprised to hear that the municipality is considering the project.

"It’s something we heard a long, long, long time ago," said the woman, who lives halfway between the Halifax and Bayers Road shopping centres. She said she didn’t want to give her name.

"My hope is that they’ll have other options."

There was considerable opposition to a recent plan to widen Chebucto Road at the Mumford Road intersection to ease rush-hour traffic on its way to the Armdale Roundabout.

People who live on Chebucto staged morning rush-hour protests in their front yards, put up yellow police tape to mark the loss of parts of their lawns and started a campaign called People, Not Cars. That experience was not lost on city hall.

When asked by Coun. Patrick Murphy (Halifax North End) how Metro Transit will deal with the public on the issue, the city’s public works director said a list of design options will come to council first.

"Staff would benefit from the (experience) of the most recent project," Mike Labrecque said, adding later that staffers have acknowledged they could have done better in their dealings with people living on Chebucto.

The municipality has put the Bayers Road widening project in the No. 2 spot on a list of five priorities for Metro Transit in the next five years.

( apugsley@herald.ca)

[Dmajackson]

This is a great idea! Bayers Road connects to Mumford and Bayers Road Terminal and should have bus lanes. My bus passes through Bayers Road during rush hour and it is extremely slow.

This is just a thought but they should consider upgrading Bayers Road Terminal and the street in front. Here a few ideas:
*They should have more seating facing the direction of travel.
*A covered sidewalk on the Village side could be covered.
*Desmond Avenue should be bus, delivery truck and local traffic only.
*A specialized taffic light should be at the corner of Desmond and Bayers. THis light should only switch when a bus is aproaching allowing the bus to continue through without waiting.
*A crosswalk near the bus stop.

[spaustin]

I'm not terribly familiar with this part of town (only ever through there to get somewhere else now and then) but it has been my thought for a quite a while that the city should make use of reversing lanes on wide streets to accommodate bus only routes. Installing a reversing bus only lane would save having to widen the street and avoid political and legal battles like Chebucto Road. Rush hour is almost always just one direction in this city anyway and will be for a long time to come so lets turn that to our advantage. The bus would be a heck of a lot more attractive if it could cruise down Quinpool, Bayers, Robie and say Portland past all the grid lock. To me it would be a great way to use what has already been built much more efficiently. It would probably be real cheap to do to compared to the alternatives.

[Dmajackson]

The only posible problem with the reversing lane is there's always buses going both directions which would force one onto the street. It would be cheap and effective during peak hours but they'll have to carefully schedule which direction during what time of day. Another possible problem is they would have to remove a normal traffic lane to fit any type of bus lane in certain sections (like near Connaught/the HSC). As long as its a continuous lane i welcome the idea. On roads where buses constantly merge in and out of traffic the vehicles commonly dont let them back in (i.e. Bedford Highway).

[spaustin]

Originally Posted by Bedford_DJ

The only posible problem with the reversing lane is there's always buses going both directions which would force one onto the street. It would be cheap and effective during peak hours but they'll have to carefully schedule which direction during what time of day. Another possible problem is they would have to remove a normal traffic lane to fit any type of bus lane in certain sections (like near Connaught/the HSC). As long as its a continuous lane i welcome the idea. On roads where buses constantly merge in and out of traffic the vehicles commonly dont let them back in (i.e. Bedford Highway).

Difficulties yes, but surely not insurmountable. The lanes would be for buses going with rush hour only. It's not really such a big deal for buses going against the flow to be in with normal traffic. Have you been down Quinpool at rush hour? In the morning you could run down the middle of the two outbound lanes and never get hit! Any new reversing lanes would flip at noon or something to the other side like they do already at the bridge and on the approach to the Rotary from Spryfield or, possibly, turn off during off peak hours. There would probably be sections where some roadwork would be needed, but on a lot of these long four lane streatches, there is basically one lane of surplus capacity at all times... it just flips sides during the day. Bus merging is a little tougher, but there is nothing to say the reversing lanes couldn't be the ones nearest the sidewalk (cars would cut across them to get into driveways only, which shouldn't be a problem most of the time). Then the bus wouldn't have to merge back into traffic at all! Where there is room you could even have pull off bus stops so that express buses could easily get in front of the "stop everywhere variety" and still take advantage of the dedicated lane. The idea isn't a perfect solution, but I think it would make a big difference, be pretty cost effective and make the most of what we have already built.

[Keith P.]

Bayers Rd is THE major route in and out of the city. Unlike Chebucto, there is plenty of room to widen it. It needed to be done 20 years ago and should be done ASAP.

[someone123]

Looking at Google maps, most buildings on the North side of Bayers Rd between Joseph Howe and Connaught have a large setback. As a result, widening this section of road would be relatively painless.

My guess is that this has been planned since the 50s or 60s.

[Haliguy]

Originally Posted by someone123

Looking at Google maps, most buildings on the North side of Bayers Rd between Joseph Howe and Connaught have a large setback. As a result, widening this section of road would be relatively painless.

My guess is that this has been planned since the 50s or 60s.

That would my guess as well.

[Dmajackson]

Originally Posted by someone123

Looking at Google maps, most buildings on the North side of Bayers Rd between Joseph Howe and Connaught have a large setback. As a result, widening this section of road would be relatively painless.

My guess is that this has been planned since the 50s or 60s.

Yah most of the buildings are set back. I was only thinking of right between Conaught and HSC might be a problem. The bus lanes probably wouldn't extend up to Joe Howe seeing that most of the buses turn down Desmond. If you look carefully at the map for the 6955 Bayers Road proposal the do have the bus lane and a little pull off lane for constantly stopping buses.

[hfx_chris]

They would only need to widen Bayers by 1 lane. Although, it would be nice too if they could develop the rail cut into some sort of transit corridor... but if we're talking about widening, 1 extra lane is all they need. Then use traffic control like everyone is suggesting to make a reversing lane. The reversing lane would be the center lane as such:



In the morning, the right-hand lane is the bus-only lane for buses heading into Halifax, and in the afternoon the left-hand lane is the bus-only lane for buses heading out of the city. There's no issue of trying to merge back into traffic.
And even if that was an issue, I recall it mentioned once a couple years back that they wanted to amend the Motor Vehicle Act so that cars would have to yield to buses pulling away from stops when their left-turn light was on. Dunno why that never moved forward.

Originally Posted by Bedford_DJ

*They should have more seating facing the direction of travel.

What?

*A specialized taffic light should be at the corner of Desmond and Bayers. THis light should only switch when a bus is aproaching allowing the bus to continue through without waiting.

Yes! Yes! How many times have we sat on a bus at the corner of Desmond and Bayers trying to head straight across onto the ramp... why there is no light there is beyond me, a lot of buses make that crossing!

Originally Posted by Herald article

"Staff would benefit from the (experience) of the most recent project," Mike Labrecque said, adding later that staffers have acknowledged they could have done better in their dealings with people living on Chebucto.

Yeah, like not try and pit neighbour against neighbour? Or perhaps you're realizing the entire idea of trying to steal away peoples front yards was just a boneheaded idea from the get go?

[Dmajackson]

Ok now its clear to me what you guys are talking about and it would work. By direction facing seats i mean at the terminal all the sidewalk seats face the wrong way. You cant see your bus until its at the stop and sometimes the buses stop early and you dont see the bus until its gone. I've seen people chasing buses becaue they couldn't see it. They did mention something about the Motor Vehicle Amendment but i think they realized no one would obey it. Drivers are nasty to bus drivers. More then once i've been flung fowards violently in the bus because someone cut us off. I smashed my head on a pole or someone i cant remember which right now.

[hfx_chris]

Originally Posted by Bedford_DJ

Ok now its clear to me what you guys are talking about and it would work. By direction facing seats i mean at the terminal all the sidewalk seats face the wrong way. You cant see your bus until its at the stop and sometimes the buses stop early and you dont see the bus until its gone. I've seen people chasing buses becaue they couldn't see it. They did mention something about the Motor Vehicle Amendment but i think they realized no one would obey it. Drivers are nasty to bus drivers. More then once i've been flung fowards violently in the bus because someone cut us off. I smashed my head on a pole or someone i cant remember which right now.

Ah I see what you mean now about the seating. You're referring to the benches along the mall-side of Desmond that face the wrong direction and hide you behind those sections of the building that stick out.
As for nobody obeying, I think people would begin to if the fine was high enough. Other provinces have similar laws in their motor vehicle acts, and it works there!