FALL RIVER: Residents in the Fall River have posted online curious as to why why developments are looked at individually by HRM when it comes to traffic impacts.
With five or six developments proposed for the Fall River area, and traffic already headache-like at rush hour, there were several comments on online community pages wondering why each development has its own traffic study, and why HRM doesn’t look at all the developments as one when it comes to the impact traffic from all will have on the area.
More so, they’d like HRM to consider all of the developments and their impacts on traffic in the area already. A helicopter view, if you will.
Councillor Cathy Deagle Gammon was posed that question during a sit-down interview at her Fall River home as part of the Councillors Corner column. It was a question she asked HRM CAO Jacques Dube during a meeting she had recently with him to talk over several topics.
“We need to have a helicopter view about what is the impact on Fall River of all of this traffic were going to have,” she said. “If that development should happen at Windgate, we’re going to have what will happen on Fall River Road.
“There are developments proposed on McPherson’s Loop, two on Highway 2 in Fall River, and what might happen down on Ingram Drive.”
She calls it an “interesting opportunity” to get a different look at how all developments are viewed in the future.
“We have an interesting opportunity, I think, to be able to say about all of these developments, what do we do around the whole traffic management within this community,” she said, “and can we start having that helicopter view when we’re looking at these development agreements and making decisions.”
Deagle Gammon said she will be meeting with Peter Duncan, Director and Chief Planner with HRM, soon.
“This is in his wheelhouse,” she said. “I want to find out what is our next step. I want to know how we get that bigger vision at the traffic impact.”
