Safety improvements coming for deadly intersection

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This article was published 29/02/2024 (556 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

The grieving mother of a young woman killed by a drunk driver is relieved city officials have finally approved the construction of a four-way stop at the intersection where her daughter’s vehicle was struck — but remains uneasy over how long it may take to build.

Jordyn Reimer, 24, was a designated driver while out with family and friends early in the morning on May 1, 2022, when an impaired driver struck her Jeep while she was crossing Bond Street at Kildare Avenue West.

Tyler Scott Goodman, who had spent the night drinking at a local Transcona bar, drove his pickup truck through a stop sign at 108 km/h (Bond Street is a 50 km/h zone). He has since pleaded guilty and been sentenced for impaired driving causing death and failing to remain at the scene.

“We’re very pleased about it,” the victim’s mother, Karen Reimer, said of the plan on Thursday.

“We recognize that … it wouldn’t have changed his behaviour in any way, he was still going to do what he did, but it would have afforded Jordyn the opportunity to stop and look and see him barrelling towards her, and possibly saved her life because she wouldn’t have entered the intersection.”

City of Winnipeg spokeswoman Julie Dooley said officials issued the approval in early February, but as yet there’s no firm date for installation of additional stop signs at the intersection.

“We will have the stop signs installed as resources allow. The work is in our queue,” said Dooley.

There is currently a two-way stop, north-south, along Bond.

The grieving mom said she’s concerned with how long the upgrades will be on the city’s to-do list.

“That would be my only concern: how long does it take, because the longer it takes, the more opportunity there is for another catastrophe to happen at that intersection,” said Reimer. “I would hate for anyone else to be killed at that intersection while we are waiting.”

She said she thinks turning the intersection into a four-way stop will save lives.

City council’s public-works committee will consider a broader traffic safety enhancement program for Kildare Avenue at a special budget meeting Friday, which Reimer said she favours.

“I think any time they’re going to study and look at problem intersections and add anything, whether it’s a stop sign or a roundabout, whatever it is — if they know they have problem intersections and people are getting into crashes, it can’t be anything but a positive,” she said.

A bureaucratic report on the program said Transcona Coun. Russ Wyatt requested the study of adding roundabouts and creating T-intersections — by closing one side of a four-way intersection — rather than adding four-way stops to Kildare. City officials stated that could present difficulties, including the amount of space needed and a significant (potentially $20 million) price tag.

In the report, public-works officials recommend a multi-year traffic study, with input from the area, as part of city council’s existing traffic-calming program.

Wyatt said he wants safety improved on heavily travelled Kildare Avenue, and at other smaller intersections across the city, but added he thinks it’s not a priority of the mayor or his executive policy committee.

“That’s very unfortunate, because intersection improvements and upgrades could really create amazing efficiencies in getting traffic moving,” he said. “Intersection upgrades are not that expensive.”

erik.pindera@freepress.mb.ca