McKnight Boulevard & John Laurie Boulevard

[YYCguys]

I get the impression that the shakers and movers in City Hall aren't very much into tunnels. It was with quite a bit of reluctance that the Airport Tunnel was put into PlanIt. They always seem to find a cheaper alternative, albeit not very traffic friendly, to tunnelling.

[dmuzika]

Originally Posted by Slug

Way back when I was commuting from University back home to Airdrie I would be in favor on a northbound turning light onto Deerfoot but now I can understand doing that would add way too much congestion onto Deerfoot. There still is a point at around 3pm (right when I usually got off) where its almost impossible to make that turn since congestion going the other way is not enough for people to stop and let you by and too much to find a gap. 64th is better but not during holiday shopping season and country hills was only 2 lanes back then Im glad they are finally getting a viable westbound to northbound alternative with the ring road however its around 10 years late.

Signals at McKnight & Deerfoot as well as 64 Ave NE & Deerfoot will happen, if you look at the 2009 Traffic Signal Priority List, http://www.calgary.ca/docgallery/bu/...rrant_list.pdf, McKnight & Deerfoot is listed at the very top of the list (listed higher than the #1 intersection) while 64 Ave NE & Deerfoot is listed as #14. I sent an e-mail to the city inquiring about the possibilty of traffic signals at McKnight Blvd & Deerfoot Trail NB ramp and recieved the following reply:

Thank you for your note, which was forwarded to us by Alderman Hawkesworth’s office.

As you are aware, the east intersection at the McKnight Boulevard and Deerfoot Trail interchange warrants a traffic signal. This intersection is under the jurisdiction of Alberta Transportation. They have approved funding for a traffic signal at this location and installation of this signal will be completed by early in 2010.

I trust that this information will be of assistance.

Pat Grisak, P. Eng.
Senior Traffic Signals Engineer
City of Calgary Roads
2808 Spiller Road SE
Phone: 403-268-2513
E-mail: pat.grisak@calgary.ca

[Slug]

So it does look like they were holding off till the ring road was done.

[dmuzika]

Originally Posted by Koolfire

Smoothing out that intersection should be higher priorty. Those stairs that pedestrains use to get down to the intersection look really dangerous. I always think one slip and they would be in the intersection.

As for interchanges there are not possible, I always thought that a tunnel right under the current road with no local access between Deerfoot and west of 4th St NW would work well, leave 4 lanes on top for local access and alternate route if there is an accident in the tunnel. It would be a tight fit for 6 lanes but it might be possible without additional land. 4 plus a shoulder would be best.

I like the idea of the tunnel - it seems to mirror the Cassiar Tunnel concept in Vancouver (Trans Canada Hwy & Hastings St), however I don't think traffic on McKnight is heavy enough to warrent a tunnel. If the Trans Canada Hwy followed McKnight instead of 16 Ave and traffic levels were similar to Deerfoot Trail, then a tunnel might be warrented.

As a side note, I think the city planners of the past dropped the ball with Trans Canada Hwy & McKnight Blvd. The corridor could have been better utilized as the north E-W route if McKnight would have been constructed in a SE direction to connect with 16 Ave (say 30+ years ago before Sunridge and Rundle were developed) and maybe should have connected with Crowchild before Brentwood was developed.

[mersar]

Who here has the link for those old city plans that showed the original proposed routing for the transcanada? I recall someone posted them a while back but I can't remember where.

[srperrycgy]

http://albertaroads.homestead.com/Ca...ans/index.html

[YYCguys]

^ Wow! I had no idea that the TCH was to take a 24th Avenue N alignment through the NW part of the city! Would be interesting to imagine how the city would have developed had that actually happened!

[Joborule]

I think they really screwed up the TCH and screwed the north out of a proper E-W route. I do like the urban corridor idea, but you need to have a freeway to get from one end of the city to the other instead of that.

I wonder if it would be possible to tunnel 16th ave between Deerfoot and Crowchild so you have the workings of making the TCH a full freeway while keeping a urban corridor on the ground above?

[freeweed]

I think the city has (rightly, in my opinion) abandoned the idea of having dozens of freeways everywhere. The TCH will forever be relegated to what is in essence a large residential collector.

JL/McK are the best shot for an E-W road in the north, with Glenmore taking it for the south. With the north ring road approaching completion in 2011-12, I just don't see anyone pushing for yet another freeway. Who would it serve?

[You Need A Thneed]

Originally Posted by freeweed

I think the city has (rightly, in my opinion) abandoned the idea of having dozens of freeways everywhere. The TCH will forever be relegated to what is in essence a large residential collector.

JL/McK are the best shot for an E-W road in the north, with Glenmore taking it for the south. With the north ring road approaching completion in 2011-12, I just don't see anyone pushing for yet another freeway. Who would it serve?

I don't think we need freeways everywhere either, though it still would be nice to have McKnight upgraded a bit.

16th is now upgraded, but before it was upgraded - north of Downtown E/W routes:

Memorial - slow 50 km/h section in the middle
16th - was a long 50 km/h section in the middle
32nd ave eat of deerfoot pretty much turns into a residential collector west of Edmonton Trail
McKnight - 50km/h undivided section in the middle
64th - blocked by Airport and Nose Hill
Beddington - doesn't extend east of Airport
Airport Trail - doesn't extend west of Airport (and no possible way to take Airport Trail to Deerfoot Trail - Beddington Trail or vice versa
Country Hills Blvd - Goes all the way across town, but most of it isn't expressway.

There's nothing even at an expressway standard connecting the East and West north of downtown, even with the upgrades to 16th Ave. A few blocks of upgrade to McKnight would make it a near expressway all the way across town.

[mersar]

Technically 16th still has a long 50km/h section in the middle (past SAIT is still 50 for some reason)... and another 50km/h section in the west through Montgomery. That west part is the one part that I feel needs some work on it, far too many people treat it as a full expressway and fly through there, and as that pedestrian death there the other day helped to illustrate its not the safest in terms of pedestrian interaction either.

Airport Trail will have some connection to Beddington via Harvest Hills once the west extension is built, currently scheduled for 2010 I believe. Won't really do much though, at best if the tunnel gets built and the east extension all the way to Stoney it may be a decent route once more development happens in the NE but thats about it.

I personally don't count Beddington as an E-W connector, I view it more N-S then anything else. Especially with all the new development north of Stoney that if anything uses it as a route to connect to Deerfoot and to downtown

Country Hills is probably the best E-W at the current time in my view, its mostly 60km/h sure, but its pretty decent in terms of capacity especially with the improvements at Beddington and Shaganappi. Overall though due to its proximity to Stoney it likely will see a decrease in usage to an extent after tomorrow.

[You Need A Thneed]

Originally Posted by mersar

Country Hills is probably the best E-W at the current time in my view, its mostly 60km/h sure, but its pretty decent in terms of capacity especially with the improvements at Beddington and Shaganappi. Overall though due to its proximity to Stoney it likely will see a decrease in usage to an extent after tomorrow.

Country Hills is decent for the people further up North, but really doesn't help at all if, say I want to drive to the university from my place, or something like that. Too far out of the way to get up there for not much gain in term of spped of road.

Airport Trail will be much improved with the connection to Harvest Hills Blvd, but still REALLY needs the tunnel under the runway, IMO.

Airport Trail - harvest Hills Blvd - Beddington Trail would be a pretty good "expressway" - much better then anything else we have - other then Stoney which is opening today. It's certainly a route that I hope I can use soon - as I currently have to drive 64th Ave - Metis Trail (southbound) - McKnight - Deerfoot - Beddington Trail to get to our Bible study group every week. An Airport Trail connection would cut 5-10 minutes off of that 20-25 minute drive.

Either way, the Opening of Stoney Trail today is going to help the congestion on Country Hills and McKnight quite a bit.

[craner]

I agree the city should pursue upgrading McKnight & John Laurie as the main E-W route in the north. It would be nice if they could get it up to freeway standards, connect it to the TCH and redesignate it as the TCH route through town.
(I know, I know, I'm dreaming).

[Koolfire]

Originally Posted by craner

I agree the city should pursue upgrading McKnight & John Laurie as the main E-W route in the north. It would be nice if they could get it up to freeway standards, connect it to the TCH and redesignate it as the TCH route through town.
(I know, I know, I'm dreaming).

What makes John Laurie a nice route is that it's non stop from 4th NW to Shaganappi. But there is a bunch of South Bound turns that would have to get upgrade interchanges to bring it up to freeway standards which would be huge cost.

[Blader]

Originally Posted by craner

I agree the city should pursue upgrading McKnight & John Laurie as the main E-W route in the north. It would be nice if they could get it up to freeway standards, connect it to the TCH and redesignate it as the TCH route through town.
(I know, I know, I'm dreaming).

I sure hope your dreaming, I don't want inner city freeways.

[jsbertram]

Originally Posted by Blader

I sure hope your dreaming, I don't want inner city freeways.

I gotta laugh at John Laurie Boulevard being an "Inner City" freeway.

My best friend while growing up in Collingwood came across some of his dad's old photos. While his kids were laughing about seeing pictures of him as a toddler, he was laughing at one photo of the view outside his childhood home's livingroom window.

An uninterrupted vista of Nose Hill. No JLB. No 14th St. Just cows, fences and bald prairie. It could have been a view from "little house on the prairie"

Even the house I grew up in across the street from him was missing (it wouldn't be built for another year).

They did, however have a half-width paved street pending completion of the other sidewalk when the neighbourhood expanded.

How soon will it before someone will consider Hidden Valley "Inner City"?

[eternallyme]

Originally Posted by mersar

Technically 16th still has a long 50km/h section in the middle (past SAIT is still 50 for some reason)... and another 50km/h section in the west through Montgomery. That west part is the one part that I feel needs some work on it, far too many people treat it as a full expressway and fly through there, and as that pedestrian death there the other day helped to illustrate its not the safest in terms of pedestrian interaction either.

Airport Trail will have some connection to Beddington via Harvest Hills once the west extension is built, currently scheduled for 2010 I believe. Won't really do much though, at best if the tunnel gets built and the east extension all the way to Stoney it may be a decent route once more development happens in the NE but thats about it.

I personally don't count Beddington as an E-W connector, I view it more N-S then anything else. Especially with all the new development north of Stoney that if anything uses it as a route to connect to Deerfoot and to downtown

Country Hills is probably the best E-W at the current time in my view, its mostly 60km/h sure, but its pretty decent in terms of capacity especially with the improvements at Beddington and Shaganappi. Overall though due to its proximity to Stoney it likely will see a decrease in usage to an extent after tomorrow.

The Montgomery section is a tricky one for sure. I can think of two options:

1) Bypass the route with a new Bow River bridge connecting onto Sarcee Trail, turning it back to local use. That would likely require combining the Shaganappi and Bowness Road interchanges and also introducing local connections via that point. An Uxbridge Drive interchange would make it a freeway from Crowchild Trail to the west city limits

2) RIRO-expressway along 16th through Montgomery. That would require at least 2 or 3 pedestrian overpasses and a full or partial interchange at Home Road (plus another flyover, probably at 44th Street). It does create a major issue of cars turning into the commercial establishments off a 70-80 km/h expressway.

[craner]

Originally Posted by eternallyme

The Montgomery section is a tricky one for sure. I can think of two options:

I had a thought that they should swith the TCH ROW to the Bowness Rd. alignment in this area and have the current TCH alignment as the service road. Would require some expropriation of houses for TCH upgrading and interchanges but it gets the highway further away from the river and would have minimal impact as far as dividing an existing community (IMO). As you say, all those business entrances/exits dumping right on to the TCH are a joke. I think once the TCH reaches Shouldice Park it would be fairly straight forward to upgrade it to the west city limits (new railway bridge required though).

[YYCguys]

^Or perhaps, moving from east to west, let the TCH dip southward over the Bow River at Shaganappi and hug the CPR line and hook up to the original alignment at Bowdale Cres.

[jsbertram]

Originally Posted by YYCguys

^ Wow! I had no idea that the TCH was to take a 24th Avenue N alignment through the NW part of the city! Would be interesting to imagine how the city would have developed had that actually happened!

If the 24th Ave TCH was built in the 70s, by now (40 years later) we'd be b*tching about urban blight along it's length. Imagine a TCH version of today's 36th St NE stretching from Bowness in the west to Sunridge in the east. To steal a phrase from Churchill, "A Concrete Curtain has descended across the north of the city"

Today we'd be wanting to follow Boston's lead, and do our own Big Dig for the TCH to reclaim the lost land for development & reconnecting the downtown with the 'inner city' north of 24th Ave.

For what ever reason, this didn't happen here. It did happen in many American cities in the 60s and 70s, and now they are spending $ Tens of Billions $ to remove those structures & reconnect broken parts of their cities.