An Open letter To The City of Ottawa Concerning The Manotick Truck Route
By Bruce Miller, Manotick Concerned Citizens Against Truck Traffic
Beginning in the middle of the last decade, if not before, it was recognized by the City of Ottawa transportation planning officials, members of City Council and certainly residents and business people as well as road users in Manotick that there was a serious public safety issue relevant to the road system through the Village. The continued use of Bridge Street and Main Street through the Village as a designated City of Ottawa through truck route joining the arterial roads approaching the Village from east, west, north and south was problematical, in particular for pedestrian and bicycle users.
Notwithstanding the safety concerns which arose due to the use of local roads through Manotick for cross-regional truck traffic, and despite the fact that City transportation and capital planning did take place to institute an alternative road network which would allow the closure for through trucks in Manotick, no actions of meaningful substance to have the designated truck route closed have been instituted by the City. There has been much attention paid to this issue by the local Ward City Council members, Mayor Sutcliffe has visited one of the more dangerous locations on the route in the Summer of 2023, the Manotick Village Community Association (MVCA) has made the issue its highest priority infrastructure need, and there have even been public demonstrations staged by senior citizens who live in two senior’s facilities adjacent to Bridge Street.
In the Fall of 2023, our group of concerned citizens decided to take action to speak up publicly regarding this issue. While we want to work in coordination with MVCA to the same end to eliminate the truck route through the Village, our group is independent from MVCA. Our approach is about taking concrete action in the short term to secure a solution to the safety and public nuisance problem by developing an alternative route that is an obvious one, and to close the route through the Village.
The purpose of this open letter is to outline the steps which we feel should be taken by the City immediately to begin the process of closing the designated through truck route, and to this end we are seeking the support of other like-minded citizens and business owners in the Village. We are asking that you join us in speaking strongly to our elected representatives that the time has come to stop talking about this issue as we have been doing for years, and to get on with doing something meaningful.
The people of our group of Concerned Citizens are residents of the Village with professional experience in government relations and road safety, and representatives of businesses, public institutions and multi-family residential facilities along the truck route. We call our group Manotick Concerned Citizens Against Truck Traffic or MCCATT.
The Vimy Bridge, connecting Earl Armstrong Road with Prince of Wales Drive and Strandherd Drive, was the intended new truck route across Rideau River in South Ottawa when planned and constructed. The Truck Route crossing the Rideau River in Manotick was to be closed. However, this did not happen despite the fact that planning was done by the City to extend Earl Armstrong Road to create an efficient connection for trucks to the Vimy crossing. The six lane Vimy Bridge on a typical weekday carries one third of the volume of heavy commercial trucks compared to the two lane bridges over the Rideau Canal on Bridge Street in Manotick.
As stated in an independent report which was prepared in 2023 by Dr. Jim Sproule, a resident of Manotick and Deputy Chief Coroner of Ontario (retired), and as shown by many near misses and one recent traffic fatality in the summer of. 2023, an extremely hazardous situation for residents, pedestrians and bicyclists using the truck route through Manotick has in essence been “built into” the system. Anyone who has spent any time during a week day at the intersection of Bridge and Main Streets can see this. Mayor Sutcliffe was invited to be there by the MVCA in the summer of 2023 and was reportedly quite concerned by what he saw. The roadside along Bridge Street includes two seniors residences, Manotick Public School, two churches, a public park, several single family homes as well as businesses, and an outdoor swimming pool used by members of a swimming club.
This issue has been at the forefront in the Village for years. Councillor David Brown has been supportive of getting something done to address the problem by developing an alternative truck route and closing the one through the Village. The MVCA has also placed action on this issue as their highest transportation priority. Notwithstanding, there was nothing meaningful regarding the development of an alternative through truck route included in the 2024 City of Ottawa budget as has been the case in previous City budgets. We have made overtures to our representatives at the Provincial and Federal levels who have stated that they recognize the problem but who have reminded us that the City must take the initial action. We believe that there would be support for higher government level funding for development of an alternative route, but to date there has been no written response to our request for letters of support for participation in funding from either the Federal or Provincial representatives.
In our budget consultation presentation on November 30, 2023 to the City of Ottawa South Ward Councillors, we requested that the City consider our request to amend the budget to include the multi-year funding to close the truck route through Manotick. This request was handled in the same way as previous initiatives to address the problem. A budget item, subsequently approved, to include a speed enforcement camera on Bridge Street was trumpeted as listening to our concerns, but which in fact will do nothing to advance the closing of the truck route or even reduce the numbers of trucks using the existing route. Earlier this year there was an announcement of a funding agreement between the City and the Province worth in excess of $500 million, which includes another interchange on Highway 416 at the intersection of Barnsdale Road. We were discouraged to discover that there was no provision in the agreement for funding which would lead to closing of the truck route, and which in fact could lead to higher truck volumes through the Village because of the new interchange.
The plan as to how to address this serious public safety issue is the City’s responsibility. It has been talked about enough. Development in Manotick is continuing unabated despite this issue, while in fact the need to relocate the truck route should be a constraint on development. It is time to stop the talking and get on with taking action to solve the problem.
Our group is determined to work to mobilize the residents and businesses in our community to maintain the City’s attention to this matter, and ultimately to see that meaningful action is taken to get the through truck traffic out of the Village. If any resident or business owner wants to get in touch with us to be an active participant in our group or to offer your feedback on the issue, we want to hear from you. You can reach us at MCCATT@proton.me.
