Pattullo Bridge Rehabilitation Project

[BCPhil]

No. 4 lanes is inadequate. 6 is barely acceptable.

It really should be 7 lanes. 3 North, 4 South.

The real problem with the bridge, is all the merging down that needs to happen.

Currently, only 1 lane from McBride goes through, which automatically backs it up to 10th. That's not a New West doesn't have enough capacity problem, that's a bridge is too small. To make the bridge actually work at PM peak, they CLOSE one access point. That just makes even MORE people drive through DOWNTOWN New Westmister.

Seriously, what the hell are they thinking? "Oh, I don't like the congestion, so lets keep it exactly the same. PROBLEM SOLVED!!!!"

If you didn't have to close the access point to the bridge from Columbia, then you would have 3 sources merging at peak, a total of 4 lanes of pretty constant traffic (5 if you don't force Royal to merge down). Even a 6 lane bridge is going to have a lot of traffic merging down, clogging up streets in New West.

And in the near future, the tolls will not be a deterrent. Some traffic will divert back to the Port Mann and just pay the toll there, but people will not be able to dodge the toll on the Pattullo as easily because with the tolled GMT-Bridge, the AFB will be overpacked far beyond what it is like on either the Pattullo or AFB is today, so people will settle paying the toll. I think it will pretty much return to pre-PMB toll traffic levels, so down from now, but still seriously busy.

And if more bridges (or all) are road priced (tolled) then the Pattullo will be very popular because it is a single crossing to get from Surrey, unlike a combo of crossing the GMT+Oak/Knight