Quote:
Originally Posted by Ducay
Are you serious? As a SW resident who is "in touch", the SW ring road is not a top priority. Sure you may benefit, but the vaassstt majority of deep SW residents are having trouble getting into downtown, not the NW (as you are).
But go ahead, make your decision that is more of a provicial/federal issue. Just don't complain to CP when McIver gets elected and still can't make your terrible idea come to fruition.
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SW is severally limited in major crosstown roads though, at least to me. Off the top of my head, you have McLeod Trail, Glenmore Trail, and Crowchild north of Glenmore as the major routes that can get you across town to the other quadrants of the city. Now I'm not an expert and someone else is most likely has a better idea on the SW commute issues, but clearly the amount of road options seems to be too low for the amount of cars that use the roads in that area; especially south of Glenmore. There may be a lot of people that want to get downtown, but there is also a lot of people that want to get NW, upper SW, or even west of the city. Let's also not forget about trucks that are moving around the SW part of town.
If you want to get northwest, you're going to have to use Glenmore then go up Crowchild. If your south of Glenmore, you'll have to go up McLeod Trail to get to Glenmore if you're not using Deerfoot. If a traffic incident occurs on one of those routes during rush hour, it has to create a major jam for commuters and greatly delays them from reaching their destination. People getting downtown, NW, or any other part of the city get screwed.
Now although the North is lacking a true E-W freeway (Stoney doesn't really classify as this), the road atrial network works well enough that you have multiple ways of moving around and don't have to be forced to use one major road only. In the NE, you have 16th Ave, McKnight Blvd, Country Hills and Metis Trail in the future, and of course Deerfoot and Stoney Trail. That's several routes that can move you E-W and N-S. If one route is jammed with a traffic incident, you can use alternative routes don't get trapped. In the NW, you have 16th Ave, John Laurie, Crowchild, Country Hills, Stoney Trail, Shaganappi and Sarcee Trail to move you around. Again, good number of crosstown routes to use whether you want to get into downtown or go to work elsewhere.
The NE and NW ring roads aren't really needed for people to get around town, but since it's been built, it has greatly benefited the transportation network in those two areas of town. The road is primarily meant for trucks to go around the city and avoid lights, but it's also for commuters to use on the east side of town as another Deerfoot. This will defiantly be the case in the long term when the city moves east of Stoney. For the SW, the ring road is the same way for the most part. Trucks are going to be using the ring road to get across town, and a ton of people are going to be using it as general commute route like Deerfoot. If the SW leg that was originally planned still gets build, commuters in the SW will now have more options of getting around the city, because they won't have to rely on McLeod to go north or south alone anymore. They won't have to rely on Glenmore and even Crowchild Trail anymore to get into the NW since Sarcee Trail becomes a new option. The planners had this in mind, which seems to be why the SW leg will have so many lanes off the bat, because it's meant to have heavy traffic use off the bat.
I like Nenshi idea of improving 14 Street to make it a better route to get downtown, but it's not going to be the answer for the SW. Like it or not, the SW is going to need to have a adequate freeway style of road to complete the ring road and improve mobility in that part of town. Whether that means reopening negotiation with Tisa T'ina, or unfortunately knocking down some homes along 37 street.