Over the last several years, people in Milton have talked about issues in their neighbourhood when it comes to traffic, speeding cars and pedestrian safety. There have been far too many examples of preventable collisions in our subdivisions using Yates Drive near Bennett as a reference.
Town staff has now come up with a traffic calming policy that came before the Community Services Standing Committee a couple of weeks ago for approval. This is now sent to council for final approval on the 28th of March.
Here is an article in the Milton Canadian Champion by Christina Commissio that outlines the details.
No speedy process involved with traffic calming – Town’s new policy includes many steps, strict criteria before measures can be put in place
Milton’s first traffic calming policy was presented to councillors last week and judging by the draft plan, getting speeders to slow down won’t be a hurried process. After residents complain to Town Hall about hasty drivers barreling along their streets, it could take up to eight months for a traffic calming measure — speed bumps, curb extensions or stop signs, to name a few — to be installed, and that’s if the street meets the Town’s lengthy checklist.With $45,000 in this year’s budget allocated for traffic calming, the Town’s director of engineering Paul Cripps said one, maybe two, projects can be completed in 2011.
But there’s no shortage of demand.
“We get requests for traffic calming on a regular basis,” said Cripps. “It’s not a problem getting people engaged.”
Public engagement is a key part of the policy, which requires at least 51 per cent of households on the street to sign a petition in favour of the calming measures. If the road gets a green light from the Town, transit and emergency services to install a traffic calming device, the public will be asked for their input on the project, followed by a public meeting and community support survey. The survey has to be completed by at least 25 per cent of households on the street and show a 60 per cent support for the measure. After a traffic calming design is recommended by the Town, it will have to be approved by the Community Services Standing Committee and town council before residents are notified and the measure is implemented.
But before this process takes place, the street will have to meet a stringent point system to qualify for traffic calming. A local roadway must incur 35 points, and a collector roadway, which carries between 1,000 and over 3,000 cars daily, must incur 52 points to be eligible.
Speeding, volume, short-cutting traffic, collisions and road characteristics, such as sidewalks and distance to schools, playgrounds and retail centres will garner points. But racking up points isn’t easy.
To generate points for speeding, the Town will look at the 85 percentile of vehicles on a street, and those driving more than 15 km/h over the speed limit will incur points (once 15 km/h over the limit, five points will be assigned for every additional 2 km/h over). Every two collisions per year on a street generate one point.
One councillor is worried that the point system could be too stringent.
“It’s good to have a traffic calming policy, but will that policy catch roads we feel have major safety concerns,” asked Councillor Rick Di Lorenzo. “Thinking of some of the streets I know of that are high risk, I was trying to add the points in my mind…If drivers are going 65 to 70 km an hour (in a 50 km/h zone), then it would be enough to qualify. But if they’re going 60 or 63 or 64 km/h, it almost seems that there wouldn’t be enough points to qualify.
“I agree we should have some type of formula or calculation so it’s not all about perception. But what use is having a traffic calming policy if the formula doesn’t show many roads need traffic calming?”
Di Lorenzo said he’s curious to find out what streets in town qualify under the policy. During the community services committee meeting, Cripps assured council that certain streets will qualify.
While canvassing the Hawthorne Village neighbourhood while campaigning, Di Lorenzo said road safety and speeding were the most common complaints he heard. “On a street where it’s (speeding) a concern, you’re going to get that majority of people signing the petition.”
During the meeting, Mayor Gord Krantz said he didn’t“want to get the public’s hopes up,” with the policy, explaining that speed bumps, stop signs and lowered speed limits on one street could simply move traffic to a neighbouring street.
However, Cripps said after traffic calming is incorporated on a street, it will be re-evaluated to ensure its effectiveness.
“It’s going to be a learning process to a certain degree to find out what residents of Milton want to see and what they will respect in terms of traffic calming…it’s trial and error, hopefully more trial than error.”
Councillor Greg Nelson, chair of the committee, said he’s worried about a substantial backlog in traffic calming requests.
“There’s no community at all that doesn’t have this problem. The one concern I have is that who doesn’t want a speed bump on their street is going to be a much shorter conversation.”
Request for streets to be surveyed for traffic calming will begin in early April.
I for one am very glad we now have something in writing when it comes to traffic calming issues and there is more to be done. This policy is reactionary instead of proactive and I’d like to see what can be done in the sight approval stage of the development of our communities especially in the Boyne survey.
There are some that feel the guidelines are too stringent when it comes to evaluation of a street / area for traffic calming measures. It surely isnt a fast process, but this will definitely allow the public and the residents of the affected area an opportunity to have their say. This is similar to the process undertaken when it comes to reviewing the parking by-laws in residential streets. There first has to be a majority of people on the street wanting a review and then when it comes to input the residents will have to provide their opinions in a public process.
There might be glitches as we work through the process for the first few times and the beauty of this is now it can be amendedif we find issues to help make it a smooth process for residents and staff as well.
I asked Mr Cripps during this presentation about the time limit in between reviews in which he responded that its not in the policy itself but they will be working with the same guidelines as with the parking by-law and have a minimum of a year in between.
Does this mean every area that asks for a traffic calming device will get it? No, but it will ensure there is a public discussion with those people to come up with solutions that make sense and not cookie cutter answers to traffic control. As effective as they might be, traffic circles can not be put everywhere, as an example.
Its a good start and I hope people take advantage of this process and work with staff and council to find the best solution possible.