There was a little pushback from Essex County councillors last week when it came to a proposed new procedure for identifying safety concerns at intersections.
At last week’s meeting, the county’s manager of transportation, planning and development Jerry Behl, presented a new road safety management program for the county’s 1,084 intersections and 1,085 interconnecting segments.
“Administration carries out regular assessments and review for road safety,” explained Behl.
Behl said that the county, police and the public bring forth concerns on how to improve safety that are reviewed and when necessary, improvements are implemented. Behl said a consultant was hired, which was inline with the current budget, to come up with a four-step plan to improve road safety. This includes identifying safety opportunities, what the top ten intersections that need to be dealt with are, developing a strategy and timelines for improvements and evaluation and comparison of other similar intersections.
“Residents are usually focused on a specific location. The information we get from them is useful and we will continue to review the locations,” said Behl.
The new process of identifying and prioritizing could cost up to $300,000, inclusive of the actual infrastructure report and that amount could, if approved by council, be considered in the 2025 budget.
LaSalle Mayor Crystal Meloche felt that the new proposed road safety management program was not necessary as it is already incorporated into the county’s transportation master plan which has yet to be approved.
“When you read our own website, it says the master plan will be a visionary road map to design safe and efficient movement and enhancement of the county’s transportation infrastructure,” noted Meloche.
In response, Behl said the new program will be more specific and identify a wide range of possible modifications to intersections.
“This program will give us a list of locations where collisions are high and rank them,” said Behl.
Tecumseh Mayor Gary McNamara said that simple items such as reducing speed limits should be identified and that the intersections should be ranked low, medium and high when it comes to improvements.
Both McNamara and Essex Mayor Sherry Bondy said that the county does not contact the individual municipalities directly when it comes to road safety improvements.
“I am always willing to talk to staff about intersection safety,” countered Behl.
Proposed road safety program met with opposition at county council
By Fred Groves
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