Lukes eyes 30 km/h speed limit for residential streets

Hey there, time traveller!
This article was published 24/06/2015 (3751 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

DO you like driving 30 km/h in school zones? How about on all residential streets?

Coun. Janice Lukes, the public works chairwoman, wants Winnipeg to consider reducing all residential street speed limits to 30 km/h.

The lower limit would not apply to regional streets, which are major routes such as Main Street or Portage Avenue.

Lukes wants a pilot project in Fort Richmond, which is in her St. Norbert ward, but approval would have to come from the province first.

“That solves all of our problems with cycling, walking, to have a limited speeding amount for vehicles,” she said.

One idea she has is to piggyback off the work of former Daniel McIntyre councillor Harvey Smith, who attempted to lower residential street speed limits to 40 km/h from 50 km/h in 2012. The motion was defeated by the public works committee in 2013 after an administrative report recommended against it.

Earlier this week, a community committee in Toronto voted in favour of reducing the speed limits in some residential areas to 30 km/h.

A report by Toronto’s city staff said it could increase safety for residents and increase the number of residents using active transportation, but would be costly and might not work with every local road.

Lukes said she would be open to investigating reducing the speed limit on weekends or at certain times of the day.

“It is absolutely something in my tenure I will be looking at,” she said. “I know (Fort Richmond) has five or six schools in an area, parks, so there is nothing wrong with piloting a project to see what happens.”

 

— Kristin Annable