Highway 16 a cause for concern
- Details
- Published on Friday, April 24, 2015
By Ken Waddell
The Neepawa Banner
Over the years, a number of local citizens have expressed serious concerns about Neepawa’s Main Street, Hwy. 16. The most common complaints are about speed and noise.
A recent list of concerns about the busy thoroughfare brought to the Neepawa Banner by a concerned citizen triggered this article. The concerned citizen said that the speed of traffic and the roughness of the surface conditions, along with the liberal use of air brakes or engine retarder brakes, causes the dishes to rattle in the cupboards in their kitchen. But rattling dishes is the person’s smallest concern, it’s the safety of children, other pedestrians and vehicle occupants as well. The street is an accident waiting to happen and unfortunately, there have been a number of accidents in the past few years. Few have been life threatening but it’s only a matter of time until someone is killed on thats stretch of road.
In mid-2014, Neepawa council started to address the problem. Chief Administrative Officer Colleen Synchyshyn informed council that there is a heavy traffic flow with HyLife employees and the growth of the town is creating more demand in the area. Synchyshyn advised the Town of Neepawa council that they needed to send a signed resolution outlining the request for speed reduction on the highway east of the bridge. Synchyshyn also advised that if the request sent to the province, the Highway Board will request a speed study and recommendations from MIT's Traffic Engineering Branch before placing the request to go to a hearing.
Council passed the following resolution in June 2014.
“WHEREAS the speed limit on the P.T.H. No. 16 on the eastern boundary of the Town of Neepawa currently changes from 50 km/hr., in the restricted speed area, to a modified speed zone of 80 km/hr. for a length of 450 metres easterly;
AND WHEREAS, the Town of Neepawa has (and will) benefit from commercial and industrial expansion and development on the east side of Neepawa, thus having significant impact on traffic patterns and the speed of traffic in relation to accessing services along P.T.H. No. 16 directly east of Town;
THEREFORE BE IT RESOLVED the Town of Neepawa make application to the Highway Traffic Board to extend the 80 km/hr speed zone on that portion of P.T.H. No. 16 east of the Town of Neepawa to include the length of highway that extends past the industrial park to the road allowance on the east side of NW 26-14-15W and SW 35-14-15W.”
As of this date, there’s been no response from the province.
What the resolution asks for is a 80 km/hr speed zone to extend to the east side of Hylife. In recent years, traffic to and from Hylife has increased. The concerned citizen said they have observed a lot more than Hylife trucks and submitted a long list of trucks that looks like the “Who’s who” of the local and provincial trucking world. It’s no secret that truck traffic on Hwy. 16 is extremely heavy.
The 50 km/h limit seems to extend far further west than it does to the east. On Neepawa’s east side, the traffic is heavier than on the west side and is increasing. Obviously, more trucks and staff traffic are going to and from Hylife, but the new Hydro building is also increasing traffic and will do so in the future. The new Rocky Mountain Equipment building is generating more traffic as well.
Sgt. Mark Morehouse of the Spruce Plains RCMP said that from the beginning of 2013 to April 2015 there were 74 speeders caught on Hwy. 16 within the town limits of Neepawa. Of those, 44 were charged and most of the rest got warnings. He said there were three impaired drivers caught in that same period. The Citizens on Patrol in November 2014 spent three days checking speeds and out of 1,810 vehicle observed, there were only three that were more than 10 km/hr over the speed limit.
