Traffic chaos entangles overloaded intersection
The intersection of Northwood Street and Dominion Boulevard has troubled South Windsor residents and motorists for a long time — but this week, it’s been pushing people’s patience to the limit.
During peak morning traffic hours on Tuesday and Wednesday, drivers needing to use the intersection have been confronted with kilometre-long lineups of vehicles and wait times of 30 minutes and beyond.
“It’s been horrible, man,” said Nadeem Aslam, 35, who lives on Roxborough Boulevard — deep within a subdivision that depends on the intersection for an exit.
“All of our schedules are being disturbed. I mean, you have to wake up an hour-and-a-half early because of all that traffic.”
Aslam said his two children attend a private school, and their regular driver is refusing to pick them up this week due to the delays at the intersection. “I’ve never seen it this bad before. That intersection is always overcrowded.”
The cause of the area’s most recent traffic woes? A combination of a road closure due to construction and more than 2,000 students resuming their school schedules.
The west end of Northwood Street normally connects with Huron Church Road. But the route has been sealed off at Cleary Street since Aug. 8 — temporarily shut due to a public works project.
Residents of the surrounding neighbourhoods have only one other way out of the subdivision: the intersection of Northwood Street and Dominion Boulevard.
Aslam said he’s been told Northwood Street won’t fully reopen until Sept. 15. “It should have been ready before school started,” he fumed.
“I’m most upset about this City of Windsor. Did they not even have an idea there would be only one exit?”
Aslam said that if the city truly cared about efficiency, the construction on Northwood Street would have started at the end of June — so that the project would be complete by the beginning of the school year.
“It’s only one tiny part of the road,” he complained. “It’s only 200 metres they need to pave. And it’s taking them so long. It’s ridiculous planning.”
Holy Names Catholic High School has an estimated 1,400 students and Northwood Public School has an estimated 750.
Anne — a nearby resident who didn’t want her last name published — feels there’s a lot of blame to go around for the current situation, from impatient drivers to careless pedestrians to parents dropping off their kids at school.
“I can see that intersection from my front window,” she said. “There are dozens of school buses that bring children to school. There are students who drive to school. And also — they get driven to school by their parents.”
“You have people stopping in the road, people crossing anywhere that they want. Northwood gets bumper-to-bumper. Not just cars — it’s trucks, merchant vans, all manner of traffic,” Anne continued.
Anne has lived at her home on Longfellow Avenue since 1979. She thinks it’s past time for the city to do an extensive traffic study and take steps to relieve the intersection’s stress.
“I think someone is going to get hurt out here. A lot of bad drivers doing crazy things — making U-turns and going into the wrong lane.”
Congestion at the intersection was so bad on Wednesday morning that a Windsor police officer was stationed there to direct traffic from about 7:30 a.m. to 9 a.m.
Windsor police spokesman Sgt. Steve Betteridge said the officer was retained by the City of Windsor on an off-duty contract.
Betteridge noted there’s a specific window of hours that are giving the public trouble at the intersection, and people affected by it should be planning accordingly. “Be patient. If you’re commuting that every day, you have to be aware of it and give it extra time so that there isn’t that rushed, impatient feeling.”
But Aslam maintains that those hours are important in anyone’s day. “That’s when the kids are getting late. That’s when you’re getting late for work. Because of the stupid city’s mistake.”