WHYCOCOMAGH: The electronic speed-monitoring signs that greet motorists travelling along Trans-Canada Highway 105 through this Inverness County community could soon appear in other parts of the municipality.
During this month’s regular monthly meeting of Inverness Municipal Council, held at Whycocomagh’s Keltic Quay, Warden Betty Ann MacQuarrie and Chief Administrative Officer (CAO) Keith MacDonald updated council on the progress of discussions with the provincial Department of Transportation and Infrastructure Renewal (DTIR) regarding the potential purchase of temporary mobile electronic signage.
According to MacDonald, a recent meeting with DTIR officials confirmed that the department is leaning towards mobile speed-monitoring signs as opposed to the permanent structures now visible in such communities as Whycocomagh.
“The recommendation was to move them around, as opposed to making them permanent,” MacDonald explained, adding that “two or three” such signs could be used during high-traffic community events such as the recent Chestico Days celebrations in Port Hood.
‘We also understand that one of our neighbouring municipalities is experimenting with these signs, so I think we should show some leadership and look at our neighbours to see how they’re doing with it and to potentially save some dollars in terms of how we put it together around this.”
Warden MacQuarrie, who recalled that a recent estimate from DTIR had put each of these signs at an approximate cost of $3,500 each, noted that the issue is currently in the hands of county staff with the hope of having an update for council in the weeks to come.
“It’s our communities that are going to benefit by slowing down our traffic,” the warden suggested. “It’s something that would benefit all of our county.”
While MacQuarrie noted that such signage would only be “appropriate” in communities with a speed limit of 70 kilometres per hour or less, District 4 councillor John MacLennan suggested that the current electronic signage serving Whycocomagh has had mixed results since it was first launched by local RCMP.
“You come into the 70 (km/h zone), and the 70’s there, and then you come half a kilometre, and you’re going 70. But then you reach the regular wooden [sign], and the [speed] is 60 [km/h],” MacLennan remarked.
“So I don’t know, really, why we have one, when it seems that we could read the wooden [signs] or read the electronic.”
Conversely, Deputy Warden Alfred Poirier reported that similar signage in the Cheticamp area of his council district has resulted in safer conditions for motorists heading through the community or going to and from the Inverness County entrance to the Cape Breton Highlands National Park.
“Personally, myself, in the experiences from my driving, it seems to be working,” Poirier told the meeting, adding that business owners in Cheticamp have also noticed an improvement.
“It makes a big, big difference, because [drivers] were passing through there at 80 kilometres per hour.”