MATCHETTE TOO VITAL TO CLOSE

Almost 10,000 vehicles roll up and down Matchette Road on an average day.

Part of that road carrying mostly commuter traffic into Windsor from LaSalle bisects the Ojibway Prairie Complex, the city’s biggest home to rare and even endangered species.

Environmentalists want to stop that motorized vehicle flow to protect critters that cross between Ojibway Park to the west and the Ojibway Prairie Provincial Nature Reserve to the east.

The previous city council passed a resolution in 2014 directing administration to prepare a report “outlining the process to close Matchette Road.”

Almost two years later, the city’s transportation planners returned a bare-bones report. Without weighing in on the subject of closure, the planners point out that an environmental assessment costing anywhere from $150,000 to $250,000 would be needed to gauge the views of experts and the public to “identify alternative solutions to address the problem or opportunity and establish the preferred solution.”

The report offered no options of its own. A city council committee last week voted to defer discussion on any road closure in order to give administration more time to look into such alternatives as wildlife crossing measures or even an “eco-passage” that could serve to separate road traffic from wildlife traffic.

Matchette Road is an important component within the area’s traffic network to convey motorized vehicles.

As it enters Windsor from LaSalle, it’s a designated Class 1 Collector, which, in Ontario road-speak, means it serves to facilitate and distribute traffic between local roads and arterial roads.

Add to that the recent construction of a full traffic interchange with the Herb Gray Parkway just north of the Ojibway Complex.

Also, as part of an Ontario Municipal Board settlement with the Town of LaSalle over a proposed big-box commercial development immediately south of Ojibway Park, traffic improvements will be coming soon to the intersection of Matchette Road and Sprucewood Avenue.

With continued housing growth in the bedroom community south of Windsor, as well as planned construction of the Coco Group’s 450,000-square-foot big-box commercial development at that intersection, traffic volume along Matchette Road will surely only grow.

Because of its importance as a traffic corridor and the “higher potential for more significant impacts” — should the political desire be to close Matchette — administration advised that any environmental assessment would have to be conducted under a much more stringent (and more expensive) Schedule C process.

The latter would have to gauge impact on adjacent roads and the elimination of access to existing developed lands and lands slated for future development. It would also mean input would be required from the adjacent town, Essex County, the provincial and federal governments, municipal departments and other agencies.

Despite the current traffic volume, Matchette remains a rural cross section with gravel shoulders and open drainage ditches.

Eco-passages are miniature versions of wilderness corridors and refer to specially designed fencing and culverts aimed at reducing roadkill by providing small animals with a safe way to cross the road. The city should explore wildlife crossing alternatives that would not impede traffic flow. But leave Matchette to the motorists. And given the cost of up to a quarter-million dollars for a full-blown environmental assessment ahead of any political decision on whether or not to close a piece of Matchette, couldn’t that taxpayer money be more wisely spent bridging or tunnelling along that stretch to assist crossing critters?