Wonderland Road Widening 4 to 6 lanes

[CanadianTalk]

City engineers will recommend council to suspend the EA study to widen Wonderland Road to 6 lanes, indefinitely, due to the climate change emergency.

Article from CTV News:
https://london.ctvnews.ca/six-lane-wonde...an-flexes-muscle-1.5561510?autoPlay=true

[GreatTallNorth2]

Good news, put better cycling infrastructure and dedicated bus lanes down wonderland instead

[haljackey]

Originally Posted by CanadianTalk

City engineers will recommend council to suspend the EA study to widen Wonderland Road to 6 lanes, indefinitely, due to the climate change emergency.

Article from CTV News:
https://london.ctvnews.ca/six-lane-wonde...an-flexes-muscle-1.5561510?autoPlay=true

Will council bite? I assume the people / councilors in the affected wards want it.

Even if it gets canned- some improvements can be made still. Dual lefts, more right turn lanes, maybe even a bus lane in areas.

And yes a full cycling track could be made in one of the planned lanes possibly.

Also now that Wonderland has Highway 4's designation- there could be some upper level government funding that they may not want to back out from.

We shall see. Induced demand yes, but the city is growing and needs some traffic relief. Electrics will slowly replace gasoline/diesels too so climate issue is roughly short term (maybe).

[That_Chris]

Thank goodness.

It's gobsmackingly stupid the mega millions this city spends on constant road widening to subsidize sprawl to the detriment of inner vibrancy. The recent pivot to infill and minor transit/active transportation improvements gives me some hope London might actually prosper some day, instead of being a city that kids grow up to want to leave.

Just imagine all the urban improvements that could be made with the money it would take to turn that area of the city in to a 6 lane urban desert.

[MolsonExport]

The city has too few through roads. Many of the arterial roads roads up and die at some point (Adelaide, Huron, Hyde Park, Sarnia, Gainsborough, Wellington, Bradley, and until recently, Veterans Memorial Parkway. This means that developments are overly concentrated on the through roads that do exist (e.g., Wonderland, Fanshawe Park). And the city took a wrong turn when it abandoned light rail (which would have been the best thing to ever happen to the core since...forever).

[TallerIsBetter]

The municipal Climate Emergency declarations are kinda of a genius multi-purpose excuse for pushing anything it is applied to, as it can generate agreement from the masses who only understand climate as an emotional/quasi-religious equation.

In this case, the widening will be expensive. And the city wants to use the money elsewhere, or more likely, expect funding issues far down the road..

If you think that an individual or a city or Canada can do anything to change the weather in the future, you are mistaken. That's because you have been misled and conditioned to believe, because don't understand the science. If you understand what even the IPCC says, by looking deep enough into the voluminous reports, you will see it. So don't call me a denier, it's what the IPPC themselves say. Beyond that, politicians, academics with socioeconomic agendas, and zealous media have twisted the effects of CO2 way out of proportion with what the ICPP reports say, and have trained people who are unaware of the history of weather events to conflate weather with climate.

People already avoid the Wonderland Rd traffic by driving out to Komoka and then north of the city or to the Hyde Park and Fanshawe shopping. It will grow as a strategy and people will not give up cars and take a bus to Walmart or Golf Town because they abandon the widening. And that won't have any effect on the temperature of the planet.

[MolsonExport]

If you understand what even the IPCC says, by looking deep enough into the voluminous reports, you will see it.

I understand the science. I hold a PhD and an MSc, and I have been a Professor at Western for 16 years.

I do research on climate change, among other topics. I work with scientists who have spent decades researching the many effects that ACC is having on our ecology, from warming oceans, to bleaching coral reefs, from rising sea levels to retreating glaciers, from migrating species to mass extinctions. It is not an exaggerated threat in the slightest. It is not some distant prospect. It is the most grave threat facing humanity and the ecology. The consequences of of a business-as-usual approach will be devastating, ecologically, socially, and economically.

I take great issue with people trying to soft peddle the grave impact of climate change, simply to suit their own selfish interests.

[Truenorth00]

Forget concerns on climate. Induced demand is a thing. Widening will only temporarily improve traffic on Wonderland while making it worse throughout the city.

[Djeffery]

Originally Posted by Truenorth00

Forget concerns on climate. Induced demand is a thing. Widening will only temporarily improve traffic on Wonderland while making it worse throughout the city.

Not widening it doesn't help traffic on Wonderland or the very few alternate routes either. If widening the road causes induced demand, isn't the opposite "reduced demand"? People don't say "Oh fuck it, Wonderland is busy, I'm not leaving my house". I don't see how gridlock on Wonderland and people detouring through Byron or Wharncliffe Rd is better for the environment either. It's the only direct route on the west side of the city that goes from farm country to farm country. The city is rapidly growing on the west side and Wonderland needs to grow as well.

[Truenorth00]

Originally Posted by Djeffery

Not widening it doesn't help traffic on Wonderland or the very few alternate routes either. If widening the road causes induced demand, isn't the opposite "reduced demand"?

Which is why planners are increasingly coming around to actually reducing lanes in some places.

Let me introduce you to the Downs-Thomson paradox. Basically, traffic times at peak and transit times at peak, tend to converge on origin-destination pairs in a city as commuters adjust modal share.

So in the end, no amount of widening is going to speed things up, if your buses are stuck in traffic. You know what would help London more, than more car lanes for traffic? A transit system that changes modal share and gets drivers off the road. A bus lane here would literally help more, in the long run, than a car lane.

[Djeffery]

Not widening it means there is no room for a transit lane. There aren't even bike lanes for a good chunk of Wonderland's length, south of the river anyway. I also don't know that Wonderland is really an important transit corridor, the BRT discussion didn't even include it. There are a couple buses that go a couple blocks on Wonderland from one street then turn to another. The only route that travels a good length of Wonderland is only every 30 minutes after 730 in the morning, save for a an hour or so in the afternoon where they add a couple buses in for afternoon rush. I don't know if that kind of transit usage demands a dedicated lane each way. A much stronger case could be made for dedicated transit lanes on other roads like Richmond, or Oxford, that aren't getting BRT eventually.

[Truenorth00]

I agree that Wonderland should be widened to accommodate transit. More cars on it though, would just drive up traffic elsewhere in London. People seem to forget that when you increase road capacity in one area, those cars are still going to end up somewhere else, where they'll consume road and parking capacity.

On the broader topic, here's probably London's most popular YouTube ex-resident:

• Video Link

[MolsonExport]

Originally Posted by Truenorth00

I agree that Wonderland should be widened to accommodate transit. More cars on it though, would just drive up traffic elsewhere in London. People seem to forget that when you increase road capacity in one area, those cars are still going to end up somewhere else, where they'll consume road and parking capacity.

On the broader topic, here's probably London's most popular YouTube ex-resident:

• Video Link

I love this guy's videos. Intelligent, intuitive, and persuasive.

[Djeffery]

Population growth is what is going to make more cars on the roads and those people are still going to end up on those other roads whether Wonderland is widened or not. More so if it isn't, as they need to get wherever somehow. And to be honest, you can make Wonderland a single lane with a traffic light at either end like a construction zone and you won't push people out of their cars and onto buses in this city. And as I said, transit isn't a big part of Wonderland, so transit lanes wouldn't really help all that much.

[jammer139]

Reminds me of the old joke:


Patient: Doctor doctor it hurts when I do this.
Doctor: Then don't do that!

[haljackey]

I'm a warm supporter of the 6 lane widening given the fact Wonderland is a rare through street in London and the city is growing like a weed. If this road gridlocks, the local economy will suffer.

Cancelling it simply because the city declared a climate emergency seems odd to me. A scapegoat? There are lots of other reasons why this could be canned from cost, construction time/disruption, induced demand, etc. Besides, most cars will be electrics or hybrids 20 or so years from now which lessens their overall environmental impact.

Minor improvements to Wonderland can be made in the interim to help it flow better. Regardless if it ever goes through, I hope BRT support is 'roughed-in' at the Oxford intersection so if the west leg is approved in the future, this part of the project is already pretty much done.

[jammer139]

And a reminder to those who seem to think this youtuber is some sort of prophet of transit and biking.


Comparing Amsterdam to London is total BS.


Amsterdam is 166 sq Km with a pop density of 5214
London is 420 sq km with a pop density of 913


5.5x the pop density in less then half the sq kms


Doing transit and biking is easy in Amsterdam

Oh and their annual snow removal budget is $50k


Time to relax on mr. youtube cheerleading.

[Truenorth00]

Originally Posted by Djeffery

Population growth is what is going to make more cars on the roads and those people are still going to end up on those other roads whether Wonderland is widened or not. More so if it isn't, as they need to get wherever somehow. And to be honest, you can make Wonderland a single lane with a traffic light at either end like a construction zone and you won't push people out of their cars and onto buses in this city. And as I said, transit isn't a big part of Wonderland, so transit lanes wouldn't really help all that much.

So close to getting it....

Here's the deal. If London cannot find away to decouple traffic growth from population growth, just imagine the traffic shithole that London will be a decade from now.

Remember, you can't widen streets downtown. And as land gets more valuable in the core, there's going to be less parking there than today.

Widening Wonderland for cars, is temporary relief that will worsen things later. Pay now. Or pay more later.

[Truenorth00]

Originally Posted by jammer139

And a reminder to those who seem to think this youtuber is some sort of prophet of transit and biking.


Comparing Amsterdam to London is total BS.


Amsterdam is 166 sq Km with a pop density of 5214
London is 420 sq km with a pop density of 913


5.5x the pop density in less then half the sq kms


Doing transit and biking is easy in Amsterdam

Oh and their annual snow removal budget is $50k


Time to relax on mr. youtube cheerleading.

So what you're saying is that a denser city would enable more walkability and save the taxpayer a lot on road maintenance?

You make a good case.

[GreatTallNorth2]

Originally Posted by jammer139

And a reminder to those who seem to think this youtuber is some sort of prophet of transit and biking.


Comparing Amsterdam to London is total BS.


Amsterdam is 166 sq Km with a pop density of 5214
London is 420 sq km with a pop density of 913


5.5x the pop density in less then half the sq kms


Doing transit and biking is easy in Amsterdam

Oh and their annual snow removal budget is $50k


Time to relax on mr. youtube cheerleading.

I'm not sure I understand the logic here. It's kind of like saying to someone "your fat, you'll stay fat forever, don't worry about it".

London can do something about how our city grows. We can be build a denser, more pedestrian, transit oriented city by NOT expanding roads endlessly and using that same money to build better infrastructure for people instead of cars. I am not sure how much you have travelled Jammer139, but the best cities in the world (in my opinion anyways) are cities that have invested/are investing in these forms of transport.