More than 1,000 people have signed a petition urging the city to take action to improve pedestrian safety near a New West elementary school.
As of Dec. 5, 1,100 people had signed an online petition seeking improvements to the crosswalk at Sixth Avenue and Second Street, located next to École Herbert Spencer Elementary School. Several parents attended the Dec. 3 council meeting to highlight concerns about pedestrian safety at the intersection.
Lyndsay Cotterall, who launched the petition, told council about some of the comments parents and children had made in a video created about the intersection. Those included people describing their concerns about the “very dangerous” intersection and describing near misses and crashes at that location.
“The video shows additional examples of accidents that occur. We see people running out of the way from a car that doesn't yield or stop at the stop sign, so they're darting that car,” she said. “I hope this gives a small sample of what the community really is hoping for. I think everyone here tonight can agree we want children to feel safe getting to school.
Coun. Jaimie McEvoy said cities can be designed for what people are supposed to do, or they can be designed for what people actually do. As a lifelong pedestrian and a nearby resident, he said he frequently passes through that intersection.
“I can say that that's an intersection where drivers are not always behaving the way they're supposed to behave. … I think it's a difficult intersection,” he said. “I don't know what the stats say, I just know what I see.”
Cotterall said residents living around the intersection hear crashes every two to four weeks. In addition to fender benders, she said there are “t-boned type of accidents” that sometimes occur when vehicles on Second Street attempt to cross Sixth Avenue. She said she was motivated to act after hearing about so many close calls among residents.
“I'm seeing it. I was almost hit on Friday walking across the street. My daughter crosses that street. Her friends cross that street,” she said. “It is just like you said – there’s qualitative experiences and there's shared experiences that are very similar here, where people don't feel safe and they're on high alert. And I think that's why we've been so lucky not to have adapt at that intersection: because people something that they know intuitively is it's just not right there.”
Adam Cotterall said his daughter and mother had been in the crosswalk on Monday afternoon – only about 15 minutes before a crash. He noted that ICBC data may not reflect what community members experience at that intersection.
Tony Gilligan said the video that has been created illustrates the risks and the urgent need for action at this intersection. He said people continue to sign the petition.
“They are looking to council for positive and effective safety improvements at Sixth Avenue and Second Street, the topic of the delegation here today,” he said at the Dec. 3 meeting. “We do want to acknowledge the leadership and swift action taken by council on Nov. 25, passing the motion to undertake a secondary review of the intersection with the goal of implementing pedestrian safety upgrades in 2025. This decision reflects a strong commitment to addressing the community's concerns, and we deeply appreciate that.”
Gilligan said residents are eager to work collaboratively in support of this motion to ensure its implementation addresses both the immediate risks at the intersection and the potential traffic impacts on surrounding neighbourhoods.
“Children are three times more likely to be injured in school zones than other areas,” he said. “Hundreds of children cross the Sixth and Second street intersection every day. This is a safe route crosswalk.”
According to Gilligan, a car travelling at 30 kilometres an hour is 10 times less likely to cause a fatality than one travelling at 50 kilometres an hour; at 40 kilometres an hour, there is a 25 per cent risk of pedestrian fatality.
“We've seen multiple near-misses daily at Second and Sixth which has been undocumented to date,” he said. “Proactively addressing these indicators can prevent severe accidents or potentially fatalities.”
At the Dec. 3 meeting, council approved a motion from Mayor Patrick Johnstone related to the creation of a Vision Zero task force.
Laura Kwong, chair of the New Westminster District Parents Advisory Council, said DPAC fully supports the creation of the Vision Zero Task Force. In tandem with Vision Zero Task Force work, she requested that the City of New Westminster undertake a comprehensive review of the Safe Routes to School plans.
“It has been almost a decade since these routes were developed and published, and much has changed in our city's traffic and transportation landscape since then,” she said. “With the implementation of the active transportation network plan and six separate neighbourhood transportation plans, as well as shifts in driving behavior and traffic patterns following the pandemic, the Safe Routes to School maps need to reflect our current transportation realities.”
Kwong said concerns have been raised about pedestrian safety at several locations in New Westminster including at Sixth Avenue and Second Street (near Herbert Spencer Elementary), on Eighth Avenue (near Lord Tweedsmuir Elementary), at Queens Avenue and Eighth Street (near Fraser River Middle School), and most of the intersections around New Westminster Secondary School.
“Instead of addressing pedestrian safety at these locations in a piecemeal fashion, I'm wondering about allocating budget for a holistic approach; a comprehensive review of best active travel routes to school and the allocation of budget to begin addressing changes or upgrades to priority areas such as intersections identified in the intersection safety review that line up with best active travel routes,” she said. “This would allow us to identify the current safety risks along these routes, integrate priorities of the active transportation network plan to promote walking and cycling, address emerging traffic concerns that are resulting from recent and continued growth of our city, and ensure that these routes can remain effective and safe as New West continues to grow and change.”
At Monday’s meeting, Coun. Daniel Fontaine questioned if city staff expect to update the Safe Routes to Schools plans and maps within the next 24 to 36 months. Staff said that work is not currently in the department’s work plans for the next few years.
“It's good to clarify that, that it is not currently in the work plan,” Fontaine said. “So, if it's going to happen, it would require a motion of council or staff to come forward with that to be put into the work plan.”
Coun. Ruby Campbell said a June 2019 staff report indicated the city would look into a full stoplight option for the Second Street and Sixth Avenue intersection and mentioned that additional review of the safety of this intersection has been planned through future study, including the citywide review of school traffic control and the update to the citywide intersection and safety study that will commence in 2020.
“It would just be helpful to know if that still is on staff's radar, assuming that didn't happen because of the pandemic,” she said.
Staff will report back to council on the status of that work.
Budget 2025
At a Nov. 25 workshop on the 2025 budget: strategic priorities plan implementation strategy, council voted 4-2 in support of Fontaine’s motion that staff undertake a secondary review of intersection safety at Second Street and Sixth Avenue, including near-miss analysis, with the goal of implementing pedestrian safety upgrades, where warranted, by 2026.
“I think we should send a message to the parents, to the community, to everyone who has a concern around this, that this council does consider it as a priority for us to put into the work plan, and that we look at the near miss analysis,” Fontaine said.
Councillors Tasha Henderson, Jaimie McEvoy and Paul Minhas supported the motion. Mayor Patrick Johnstone and Coun. Ruby Campbell, who noted they had talked to community members about their concerns and supported efforts to address safety concerns, voted against the motion saying it was outside the scope of an update on council’s strategic priorities.
“I have also had many conversations with folks at Sixth and Second, and I think that it is everybody's intent that work is going to be happening in that area,” Johnstone said. “I just don't think … this is the proper process for us to bring that forward.”
Lisa Leblanc, the city’s director of engineering, said the Second Street and Sixth Avenue intersection does not appear as a priority location in the city’s most recent intersection safety study, which included data up to and including 2019.
“I'm not able to comment on whether those trends have shifted since completion of the last intersection safety study,” she said. “What we do know is that there haven't been any pedestrian or cyclist involved collisions at that location, although there are a number of property damage collisions that have occurred.”
Leblanc noted the motion approved by council references the inclusion of a near-miss analysis at that intersection.
“That has never been done at that location,” she said. “So that would be a new process and something that could be interesting. It's not something that we've done at that location in the past and may tell us something that we don't yet know, or that that hasn't been substantiated by data or technical analysis, beyond the anecdotal information that that we've heard.”
