Residents want red light on traffic project

BY RAFFY BOUDJIKANIAN

raffy.boudjikanian@transcontinental.ca

Some residents of Denault Street in Kirkland are upset about potential traffic lights going up on an intersection of their street and Henri Daoust Street, but city councillor Brian MacDonald said their worries are premature.

"We're going to progressively work our way up the ladder," said MacDonald, adding the poles for the traffic lights have been purchased, but that does not mean they will necessarily go up. Other solutions Kirkland is looking at right now include the installation of street humps, said MacDonald.

The intersection in question is just between the Pierrefonds/Roxboro borough and Kirkland, south of Antoine Faucon Street, west of St. Charles Boulevard, and north of Brunswick Boulevard.

Due to the location, a lot of cars from the northwest sector of Pierrefonds turn right on Henri Daoust Boulevard to head south to Brunswick in order to eventually reach the highway, rather than wade their way through traffic on busy St. Charles. The problem is that Henri Daoust is a residential street.

"In the morning, there are many complaints (by residents) that it's even difficult for them to get out of the driveway," MacDonald said.

According to studies that Kirkland and Pierrefonds/Roxboro have collaborated on in the past, he said, there are 5,500 to 6,000 cars driving by Henri Daoust a day, which is twice as many as the average for other residential streets.

Though Denault Street residents acknowledged the difficulties faced by their neighbours on Henri Daoust, they said they were very alarmed by the possibility of traffic lights going up near their homes.

"The house values of everybody are going to drop because of this stupid city," said Terry Fuller, who lives two doors down from where a street light might potentially go up. Fuller added the fact that a light may go up on the front lawn of his neighbour's home means residents who have bedrooms at the front of their house will find themselves unable to sleep at night.

Fuller and Robert Demchuk, another Denault resident, showed The Chronicle where they think the lights will go up last Friday.

Besides the one that would go up on the front edge of a resident's front yard, which belongs to the City of Kirkland, another would be on Henri Daoust Street, right off Antoine Faucon, and before an STM bus stop, and a third would be on the way toward Antoine Faucon from Henri Daoust, again near a public bus stop.

As a bus pulled up near that stop last Friday, Demchuk turned and nodded toward it. "See that?" he said, referring to the noise made by the bus. "Imagine that thing stopping at a light for more than two minutes," he said.

Demchuk said an acceptable solution to the current traffic problem would be for Kirkland and Pierrefonds/Roxboro to synchronize their traffic lights on St. Charles Boulevard in order to alleviate traffic.

This is something that MacDonald said he is looking into as well.

However, Pierrefonds/Roxboro councillor Burt Ward said there is a long history of traffic problems between Kirkland and his borough. He said Pierrefonds has been looking for an artery to allow its traffic to leave the north-west sector for years, but three possible exits have been blocked in the past by Kirkland on Meaney Street, Houde Street and Château-Pierrefonds.

Ward added the proposed traffic light solution would not really alleviate traffic, as people would still prefer to go down on Henri Daoust rather than turn on St. Charles Boulevard. "There are perhaps 250 homes on Antoine Faucon to Denault Street, where the lights would be installed," he said. Furthermore, he estimated the cost of the traffic lights including installation, would be upwards of $200,000.

MacDonald said he was aware that the north-west sector of Pierrefonds was developing quickly and a solution is needed. "There should be a priority in terms of getting this traffic out," he acknowledged.

According to a newsletter by Royal Lepage real estate, Pierrefonds/Roxboro was the West Island area that saw the most homes sold so far this year, with 156 sales, over twice the amount sold in the next highest area, Pointe Claire.