Re: Premier asks for expansion of road study (News, Nov. 22)
Looking at numbers can be helpful.
According to ICBC data, the leading factor in fatal car crashes in B.C. for eight of 10 years (2006-2015) was speed.
So what is one to make of the reported suggestion from the B.C. Transportation Ministry that ways to make travel along Highway 14 “more reliable” and to “increase mobility” include such features as new passing lanes and straightening curves (“Premier asks for expansion of road study”, Sooke news mirror, Nov. 22nd).
Sounds like a concession to speeders, doesn’t it? Changes that would reduce the 20-minute trip from Sooke to Colwood by maybe 10 minutes.
With one exception, there’s a good argument that this 20 kilometre stretch of the highway is not only the busiest, but also, if driven at the posted speeds, safe to drive and not in need of tens of millions of dollars in redesign and construction.
What the road could use most, which is most evident between dusk and dawn in the rain, is for the responsible party to change its model of line painting from one based on a schedule to one based on need, and to add reflective signage and lighting.
This is a good time to go out for a spin on a rainy night along one of the the worst runs of the road: go west past Slegg Lumber and up the four-lane stretch to Cutter Marine, turn about and come back down. It’s an adventure.
Brian Nimeroski, Sooke