PORT HAWKESBURY: According to the town, residents have given positive and negative reviews to the changes made to Reeves Street.
In a press release dated June 24, the Town of Port Hawkesbury confirmed that Narrative Research recently completed the public opinion portion of the Reeves Street Improvement Pilot Project Study, under the direction of the Nova Scotia Public Works.
The town said Narrative Research was commissioned to undertake this study, and the full report prepared by Narrative Research will be available soon on the town’s web site.
According to the town, the results provided invaluable insight on the current state of Reeves Street and will help guide the next steps to improve Reeves Street’s safety, function, and design.
The town said the results show more work is needed to address specific concerns regarding traffic safety and directions. They said there is already work being undertaken to improve navigation along Reeves Street, including repainting the lane markings and improving turning signage, to be completed shortly.
“Still some concerns with the MacSween intersection, primarily at Pitt Street. There was compromise in the design because of an access management piece of the project that we weren’t able to complete because the owners didn’t want it to move forward,” Port Hawkesbury CAO Terry Doyle noted. “The other thing on that intersection, it’s a more difficult area for people that are driving to follow the lines. A physical change ultimately should happen there so it’s easier to be directed without a great deal of thought on where to go. There are also some physical changes to the traffic lights that we’d like to see change so that the intersection becomes more accessible as well.”
There is also a need to better understand what other measures would further improve traffic safety and wayfinding along Reeves Street, noted the town.
“We’re concerned about the traffic markings themselves too. We’ve gone through a couple of periods of time where the traffic markings have almost disappeared. That makes it very difficult to navigate the street. You have to be able to see what you’re expected to do,” Doyle noted. “We’ve brought up the issue of better signage with respect to lane changes. Coming up Reeves Street, people should be aware that there’s going to be changes; we’re going from four lanes down to three lanes, two crossing lanes, and left-hand turning lanes.”
The CAO said the lane change entering the intersection at Tim Horton’s on Pitt Street has proved confusing. He said the town told Nova Scotia Public Works that paint will not be as effective as physical barriers.
“It was confusing to me, and I was on that as soon as the paint was dry, and automatically went into the wrong lane,” he stated. “There’s been changes since we first put that down but there’s a lot more work that has to happen there. There’s some physical work that happens there so there shouldn’t be any thought into what lane you should be going into. Some more advance notice from signage as to what lane you should be in, and some physical barriers that will actually put you in the right lane. There shouldn’t be a lot of thought around any kind of a traffic rule, it should be automatic and that’s what has to happen there to make that a safer route.”
Another aspect of the survey dealt with traffic gaining access to Reeves Street, Doyle said.
“People are happy about turning into a business, turning left off Reeves Street into the business but they find it more challenging, 57 per cent find it more challenging turning out of the business,” he stated. “There may be less opportunities to move, but once you’re moving, the traffic is much safer than the other way with the four lanes.”
On another note, the town said the survey confirmed that some changes increased pride within a sizeable segment of the community, and made the destination more attractive to a significant segment of the town’s population.
Specifically, the town pointed to façade improvements to buildings along Reeves Street, the walking trail and bike lanes, and landscaping has been recognized by a majority of residents as being beneficial. They said there is also “considerable agreement” that the changes to sidewalks, crosswalks, and intersections have made it safer for pedestrians, and streetscape improvements have created a “more urban environment” for the street.
The town noted that a “clear majority” recognize that improvements to accessibility and traffic safety are worth the extra time it may take to travel along the street.
“I think there’s a number of people that would judge it a success or a failure based on, if they take longer to drive through a piece of Reeves Street during a certain period of time, so it takes them longer to get from Point A to Point B, then it’s not working for them,” he said. “But from our perspective, we knew that at certain times of the day, it was going to be a little bit longer to travel the street but it was going to safer; it was going to be safer for pedestrians, it was going to be safer for people in vehicles. And we know that the issue with speeding has decreased dramatically. We know that the number of accidents have decreased dramatically.”
Because Nova Scotia Public Works will continue collecting data through the summer, the CAO said they cannot provide exact numbers of speeding infractions and collisions.
“We know preliminary reports from the RCMP, from the fire hall would indicate a significant decrease (in accidents). We just went through two years of COVID, traffic volumes have been up and down,” he said. “We’ll get a better, more clearer look at that later in the fall.”
Based on feedback from the residents, and despite some of the gains made, the town said more work needs to be done to make Reeves Street more accessible.
Doyle said this need for better accessibility includes the crosswalk lights at Old Sydney Road.
“We know there are still some issues,” noted Doyle. “We’d like to see improvements at crosswalks. We’d like to see them more friendly to people with hearing and vision impairments. There’s light standards for traffic lights that are obstacles to get on and off the crosswalk in a wheelchair.”
The town said it’s worth noting that many residents have changed their use of the street and its amenities in a favourable manner, with one in five being more likely to visit Reeves Street to shop or dine, or access professional services in the area. More than one in 10 residents to date have brought visitors to Reeves Street to show off the changes that have been made, the town said, noting that four in 10 have increased their use of the trails along the street and a small but noteworthy percentage of residents are biking along Reeves Street more frequently.
While the town recognized that not everyone favours the changes, it is difficult to adjust, and there is more work to do, they added that the study results indicate that they are “on the right track.”