NANCY REYNOLDS/Reflections
Have you seen it? Who decided Mountain Road should become pretty? Fallsview in all its casino splendor can’t compete.
Mountain was once a nice, tree lined route – a connecting link to the highway and west Niagara Falls. It was a rural cross section with no curbs and a crown. Today it has pink sidewalks and grassy strips on countless traffic islands. It has many such islands which some say impede emergency vehicles and snow plows.
It has a traffic circle centered with trees and flowers and more grass and lots more pink concrete.
What an attractive route for all the garbage trucks and construction vehicles that have always travelled there. It is nice for us, too.
But why?
The circle is on Mountain at Mewburn Road which once led to the dump. Where is the traffic demand? One can only suppose that a huge traffic generator is proposed for some of the vacant land nearby or that engineers have plans to connect the road to a highway or something very busy. After all, tourism is far away.
Does anybody remember the first traffic circle serving our community. It was on the Queen Elizabeth Way west of Dorchester Road. Highway traffic approached it at high speeds and no real consciousness of where to go or what exit to use. Accidents and deaths finally led to the demise of the circle, which led south toward Fort Erie, east to international bridges, west to residential areas near Lundys Lane and north to St. Catharines. It became a nightmare.
There is a new circle on the Niagara Parkway at Queenston and it is interesting for drivers who wonder who should go first and where in the world to slide off.
Are traffic engineers living in the past or are today’s drivers smarter than ever before? Is signage better perhaps or are people willing to slow down while they figure it out.
Mountain Road is a regional road and that group must have lots of money because pink cement doesn’t come cheap.
Isn’t it too bad to spend so much on pretty pavement when Stanley remains a disaster and nothing is done to smooth out the lumps.
Is there a parade in our future or is pink our new signature colour?
We will certainly need the next batch of concrete to be blue in the interest of gender equality.
3 Comments on "Reflections: Mountain Road is all nice and pretty – but why?"
Just went through the circle this morning as I live in the area and love it.
We have been anticipating for a few years that something big must be in the works for that area…big box store?…new entrance from the highway to Niagara on the Lake? First the oversized lights on the entrance to the highway and now the landscaped circle.
We welcome it as it enhances our area.
Get used to the circles…the Europeans have had them for years! Traffic flows smoothly without interuption and lights. Love It! Can’t wait to see what comes next….
Exactly my thoughts….and to compound things its 40km/h WHY?
Wide open lanes, big boulevards, sidewalk some 30ft from the road, not a school crossing in sight.
One has to wonder if there is some collusion with the NRP for future speed trap uses.
Very disappointing to read this Nancy. Is there nothing a city can do to impress folks? Everyone complains that all the money gets spent in the tourism area. The city beautifies Mountain Road and then the complaints come in of “why”! Would you prefer nothing was done anywhere? And Stanley Avenue improvements are intentionally on hold until the Thorold Stone Road extension is underway. Of course, if they fixed Stanley then tore it up to do the Thorold Stone extension, I am sure we would see another article complaining about that. When are folks going to start seeing the Niagara Falls glass as half full and filling instead of half empty and draining? Let’s get behind these improvements and thank the folks for making forward thinking improvements instead of continuing to provide the status quo. Shame on you Nancy for complaining about such a beautiful improvement to the roadway that local residents get to enjoy.