City examines Wyandotte cycling lane proposal
City council wants administration to quickly determine whether an environmental assessment is needed before agreeing to close a lane of traffic on a section of Wyandotte Street East to make way for cyclists and other active uses.
City engineer Mark Winterton was asked during Monday’s council meeting to make that determination, hopefully within the next few weeks.
Several councillors expressed a desire to move forward on reducing Wyandotte Street from four lanes to three lanes to allow for active uses between St Luke Road and Lauzon Road.
Earlier this month, council asked that both the Pillette Village and Riverside business improvement associations be consulted about the move.
Closing a vehicle lane to allow for cycling and pedestrian use is the type of move being adopted by cities across the country and beyond as many people have been adopting a more active lifestyle during the COVID-19 pandemic.
“This is working toward the new normals and would be a step in the right direction,” said Coun. Kieran Mckenzie.
The four lanes of that area of Wyandotte Street would be reduced under the plan to three lanes, one in each direction with the middle lane available for turning.
Closure of a traffic lane would also help alleviate social distancing concerns as many sidewalks in the area are narrow and the added space would help with distancing requirements during the pandemic. But given the large number of businesses along that east-end strip within the proposed lane reduction zone, there are concerns on council about safely providing adequate customer parking or curbside pickup zones for retail locations.
Coun. Jo-anne Gignac, who represents neighbourhoods in the area, expressed apprehension about whether only providing limited sections for customer pickups or parking on Wyandotte Street would be costly to some businesses outside those designated areas.
“I’m just anticipating challenges in the community on getting to some of those businesses,” she said.
Ultimately, council called on Winterton and city administration to determine whether an environmental assessment is needed that would allow for full input from businesses and address any safety concerns.
“This helps give some power back to the BIAS, so they will not have anything imposed that they don’t want,” said Coun. Chris Holt.
Otherwise, it will be left to the city’s Special Events Resource Team to make a determination on the location of pickup zones and parking areas under the temporary lane reduction plan that would remain for the duration of COVID -19 restrictions. Final approval of the SERT’S requests would need approval from the city’s police chief.
There has been an ongoing push to create permanent bikes lanes on the same stretch of Wyandotte Street dating back to 2017.
But long-term narrowing of the road will be impacted by the nearby Riverside Drive Vista project, which will force east-west vehicle traffic on to Wyandotte during construction and possibly beyond, said Jeff Hagan, the city’s transportation planning engineer.
“The intent of the Vista project is to slow down Riverside and get some of that traffic off on to Wyandotte,” he said. “We will not know (full impacts) until the project is done (some time in 2024).”