Navigating 401 near Prescott ‘blood sport,’ mayor says
The section of Highway 401 between Prescott and Brockville — scene of Monday ’s bus crash — has long been a source of concern.
Prescott resident Sheila Johnston noted that accidents along this stretch of highway have become all too familiar.
“It’s a very bad stretch,” Johnston said. “They have a lot of accidents. There’s a lot of tractor trailers, a lot of speeding.”
According to the OPP, the westbound coach bus veered off the highway Monday afternoon and slammed into a rock cut, injuring more than two dozen passengers.
Prescott Mayor Brett Todd has been sounding the alarm for months over what he terms the “blood sport” of driving on the 401 in this area.
“I don’t want to comment on an ongoing investigation but it certainly is depressingly familiar. It’s become a dangerous corridor.”
Just a month ago, a driver was killed when two transport trucks and a tanker collided on the 401 near Prescott.
In late November, two people died and four were injured in a multi-vehicle crash between Prescott and the 416 along the 401.
A man driving one of the trucks was charged with dangerous driving causing death and dangerous driving causing bodily harm in that crash.
“The bottom line is the traffic volume is increasing all the time,” Todd said Monday. “With that, and human error, things happen.”
“It’s not the time to be talking politics. My thoughts are with the people who have been hurt and the first responders on the scene and supporting them.”
Todd reiterated his belief that the area needs a third lane in both directions, as they have in Belleville and Kingston.
Todd has been pleading with provincial authorities to have this section of the 401 widened to a third lane to help ease the flow of traffic, sounding a the alarm in the fall of 2017.
“Seeing what happened here in Prescott, loss of life again, putting our first responders, our volunteer fire department at risk out there on the 401 for extended periods of time dealing with these horrific accidents, it’s a real concern for us here,” Todd told the Citizen in the fall.
“We’ve got to redouble our efforts and really get on this and look at concrete actions.”
An earlier accident, in March 2017, west of Prescott near Mallorytown, left one dead and dozens injured in a tractor-trailer collision involving a toxic spill.
Todd, vice-president of the Eastern Ontario mayors’ caucus, says lane closures due to construction exacerbate the problem.
“We’ve just got too much traffic on the road,” Todd told the Brockville Recorder and Times last month.
Prescott does not have the capacity to handle the detours, Todd says, and the driver frustration on the highway is leading to problems.
“It takes just one person to make one error there when traffic narrows down like that,” he said.
The Prescott mayor has expressed hope that a change in provincial government following this week’s election might bring a new focus to the highway concerns near Prescott.
Monday’s crash is bound to bring the topic front and centre again.