Question: Why don’t you make Raleigh and Gateway one-way streets?

Answer:

The concept of two one-way streets was considered in the 1980’s as a way of improving the north-south capacity of the route; while working around the limitations created by the rail-line. When the rail-line existed, neither Raleigh Street nor Gateway Road had a wide enough right-of-way to accommodate a 4-lane roadway, so converting Raleigh Street to a southbound road and Gateway Road to a northbound road was reviewed.

After a complete and thorough analysis, the changes were not implemented for several reasons, including:

·        The separation between the two roadways is too great to allow left turns to occur in a single step. Currently, northbound motorists on Raleigh can turn left and proceed down the intersecting street, but northbound vehicles on Gateway must turn left into the median and then wait for the signal to change. With two one-way streets all left-turning motorists would have to make a left turn and then be stored in the median waiting for the east-west signal to change to green.

·        Left turns that are now spread between the two roads would have to occur from a single roadway. The volume of left turns would be too great to be stored within the median, which can only accommodate four or five vehicles (provided the median is not already filled with vehicles from the cross-street.) This would lead to longer line-ups and increased delays for left-turning and u-turning vehicles. The u-turning vehicles waiting in the median would also cause increased delays for the east-west through traffic.

·        If vehicles could no longer travel in both directions on both Raleigh and Gateway, transit buses and motorists may have to travel in the opposite direction and then u-turn to get onto the opposite roadway to reach their destination. The increased number of turns and u-turns along the route would result in increased delays for east-west traffic as well. Increasing the number of turns a vehicle must make also increases the potential for collisions.

·        The current truck routing avoids areas with residential frontage or rear driveways where possible. With the two one-way streets, both would have to be designated as Truck Routes to allow trucks to circulate, and trucks may have to travel farther and past residences to and from their destination.

·        The cost of modifying the traffic signals, modifying and/or adding additional cross-connections and changing the signing to designate the streets as one-way would be significant.

There have been some more recent developments which make the two one-way streets concept less favourable. The former Marconi Railway Right-of-Way between Raleigh Street and Gateway Road is being acquired by the City for the North East Transit Corridor and the Northeast Pioneers Greenway. Accommodating a transit corridor between the two one-way streets would be difficult. Also, in the short term the rail bed will be used for a paved pedestrian/cycle path. Adding more cross-connections between Raleigh and Gateway to improve circulation would break the path into smaller sections, making the trail less efficient, less appealing and create more possibilities for vehicle / pedestrian conflicts.

Fortunately, the acquisition of the Marconi Railway Right-of-Way will allow for the widening of Gateway Road to accommodate left-turn lanes and other improvements at major intersections. The first of these improvements will be completed as part of the Chief Peguis Trail extension which is scheduled for completion in 2011.