Swale Watchers worried about speeding
Northeast Swale Watchers say wildlife in grassland must be protected
The Northeast Swale Watchers are concerned about speeding through the swale.
In early October, the extension of McOrmond Drive that cuts right through the Northeast Swale will open to provide a connection to the new Chief Mistawasis Bridge.
Bridge traffic is expected to range from 14,600 to 21,700 vehicles per day.
Saskatoon city council has decided the speed limit through the swale will be 50 kilometres per hour but has yet to endorse a speed limit for the stretch west of the swale.
The swale is an increasingly rare example of native prairie, featuring a wide variety of plant and animal species
The Northeast Swale Watchers is a group of about 24 people, including environmentalists, ecologists and biologists. Candace Savage spoke to the StarPhoenix on behalf of the group this week while standing on the extension of McOrmond.
Q What are your concerns about speeding ?
A Well, this area, this northeast sector of the city that these roadways are going through, has the distinction of having, not just one, not just the Northeast Swale, but also a smaller swale — these very high-quality conservation lands.
There’s almost no grassland left, almost literally none — three per cent of the grassland is left in our part of the world, and we have these high-quality areas right here, right inside city limits. That’s very, very cool. That’s locally significant. It’s regionally significant. It’s nationally significant. It’s even globally significant.
Conserving these lands really matters. They ’re a resource for us, they’re a resource for the planet. But we’re putting roads through them. OK, that’s a given. It is now. And how we move through this area matters a lot. We know that speed kills. We know that’s true for people. We’ve got animals here, both large and small, birds flying across. So how do we regulate our own behaviour so that animals can still move safely across the road without getting hit, without being terrified? How we do that is we slow down. So that’s why we’re concerned about speed.
Q What steps would you like the city to take now?
A After the roads are open, we’re going to need monitoring of speeds, for sure, monitoring of animal movement. We need to have distinctive signage so that people understand that this is a special place. This is a parkway, not a speedway. We could have speed display signs. I know that helps me to not just put my foot to the floor. We could have photo radar, just that little reminder every now and then that there’s a limit here and it’s for a reason.
In New York City, they have this amazingly successful program called Vision Zero. They were having a lot of people killed (in traffic collisions) and they discovered that setting reasonable speed limits was part of the solution, but that wasn’t enough, that you had to have enforcement. You had to have engagement and education. And that’s another thing that the city hasn’t embraced. We saw it at the last council meeting. “Oh, we’ve only got four weeks left. How are we going to get everyone onside with this?” Well, good point.
Q Given that the use of photo radar in Saskatchewan has been limited, why do you think it’s justified here?
A Why is it worth it? It’s not easy to really achieve conservation and free movement of people. It’s not an easy thing to do to maintain the integrity of these lands and have roads running through them. We want to do both.
I absolutely believe that most people on city council, maybe all people on city council, and many people on the (city hall) staff, they want to do both. But it isn’t going to happen naturally or easily. And so we don’t want to destroy these areas.
We still want animals to be able to move through and use the river corridor and so we’re going to have to take appropriate measures. And if what we know about ourselves is that we won’t slow down unless someone shakes a finger at us, then somebody’s got to shake that finger. You can do it in gentler ways, too. Signage, distinctive signage saying you are now going through this worldclass important place. You know, ‘Go wild slowly.’
Q With a road built through the swale, can you observe changes already?
A I don’t believe so, and I’m not sure people are looking yet. Having a road is one thing. Having vehicles moving back and forth all hours of the day and night and having the lights turned on, which they haven’t been yet — those things are going to begin to make a difference.
Q What are the next steps for the Northeast Swale Watchers?
A Yes, the former perimeter road (now called the Saskatoon Freeway) — well, that’s another whole issue, isn’t it? We’ve got these new roads. We need now to remove some other roads. So we need to remove Lowe Road, which goes right through the ecological heart of the Northeast Swale. And the city really needs to get serious about persuading the province not to build another major thoroughfare, a highway, a kilometre away from this road (McOrmond). That’s crazy duplication of infrastructure.
We spent $500 million on these new roads and the Traffic Bridge and Chief Mistawasis Bridge. We’re going to spend another huge sum of money to build a road a kilometre away, duplicating all this and further fragmenting and destroying this very important natural area? That’s just nuts.