People not ‘overwhelmingly’ in support of tolls: report

Nova Scotians are vocal and not overwhelmingly in support of the use of tolls to speed up the twinning of 100-series highways, according to a report on the recent public highway twinning consultations.

It’s a topic that’s also “clearly” divisive and with organized pockets of supporters and opponents.

“Thank you to everyone who took the time to weigh in on this important issue,” said Transportation and Infrastructure Renewal Minister Geoff MacLellan in a news release. “This process has provided valuable feedback to the department. Government will be making its decision based on what we heard early next week.”

The people are split on the idea of tolls and the pendulum swings toward less support, according to the report prepared by MQO Research.

Many feel there are less expensive solutions than twinning to address highway safety, which was a major concern of those providing feedback.

The province held 14 public sessions on the subject of twinning between Jan. 30 and March 9 and gathered further feedback from 5,400 through an online survey, an open online comment box, and written submissions.

At the River Bourgeois public session, the majority of people seemed opposed to both tolls and highway twinning.

The two main factors the people of that community believe contribute to poor highway conditions are driver error and high traffic congestion.

Alternative solutions to improving highway conditions other than twinning were construction of a median/barrier, additional passing lanes, additional rumble strips, mandatory driving tests for seniors, and increased police patrol on highways.

Some respondents in River Bourgeois indicated that twinning was desirable but wanted an alternative revenue generating method to tolls.

In Sydney, the general tone of the consultation was very negative toward the proposal of tolls and twinning.

Respondents also proposed a number of possible contributors to the poor condition of highways including poor engineering design of highways, poor construction of highways, poor road conditions, high traffic congestion, particularly in regards to heavy trucks, and driver error.

Frequently mentioned alternative solutions to improving highway conditions (besides twinning) included additional passing lanes, construction of a railway system, increased driver education, installation of surveillance technology and/or increased highway law enforcement/patrolling.

The comments from the Port Hawkesbury consultation were generally positive toward tolling highways.

Those at session were deeply concerned with the amount of accidents occurring on non-twinned highways and noted factors believed to be associated with high accident rates such as driver error, high traffic congestion and outdated or poor highway infrastructure.

Across the province, the report notes the corridors that would have the most support for the use of tolls to twin would be on the 104 between Sutherlands River and Antigonish.

Other sections to Port Hawkesbury are also considered potential candidates.

The report also noted that the topic of tolls becomes a lightning rod for many other topics and creates negativity toward the provincial government in terms of level of taxes, budget allocations, inequitable treatment of rural residents and financial management