City Council is not happy with the route options being put forward for the Yorkton West Truck Route Bypass."The Ministry of Highways and Infrastructure in late 2010 instructed Wardrop Engineering Inc. to review the Yorkton West Truck Route Bypass. The City received a copy of a memo in January that warrants the City advising the Ministry of the concerns about identified alignments," explained Gord Shaw, Director of Planning & Engineering with the City.
Shaw said the alignments being considered all have one thing in common, using Queen Street as a connector.
"The City is not in favour of having the West Truck Route Bypass utilize Queen Street. The reason for doing so is that it believes a better route alignment is the south that will allow for a direct connection to Hwy 16 to the southeast of the City," stated a report circulated to Council Monday.
Shaw said the issue for the City is that it currently owns land south of Queen Street which will become residential development in the future.
"The City also believes that if Queen Street is utilized as the connector to Hwy 16, this will be a serious impediment to the long term growth of the community to the south. The City has an interest in the lands to the south of Queen Street and believes these will be developed as residential. If Queen Street is utilized, this will effectively cut off these lands from other areas of the City as future development occurs. The City is already bisected with transportation corridors that affect how the community can develop. This will be one more corridor that impedes the long term growth of the community in a southerly direction," stated Shaw's report.
"Depending upon the configuration of the connection to Queen Street, the amount of developable land will be significantly reduced because of the right-of-way required by the alignment. The impact on this land by the different alignments is not fully reviewed in Wardrop's memo to the Ministry."
Councillor Chris Wyatt said with the City owning three-quarters of land south of Queen Street, Yorkton "will expand south."
Coun. Bob Maloney said using Queen Street did not make sense.
"A truck route on Queen Street would pen us in," he said. "It would behove us to look farther south for this."Coun. Ross Fisher said it was a wise thing for the City to work with the Ministry on an alternate to the ones being currently looked at. He said Yorkton will "grow past Queen Street in the foreseeable future."
Shaw said with the concerns regarding residential development City Administration was recommending a fresh look at the proposed truck route alignment.
"Administration recommends that the alignment for the truck route be considered a mile south of Queen Street. This allows the City to grow towards the traffic corridor and pan accordingly. It believes that if Queen Street is considered, there will most likely need to be traffic lights at key intersections such as Hwy #9, Gladstone Avenue and Allanbrooke Drive to accommodate north-south traffic from areas to the south. The purpose of a truck route bypass is to provide continuous movement with as few stops as possible. None of the earlier studies seem to have factored into the analysis the long term impact of land use on the Queen Street alignment," stated the report.
"Let's put it farther south. Let's do it right the first time and not compromise our future growth," he added.
