Newly elected Coun. Bob Russell wants to put a halt to construction on St. Anne Street so that council can have a closer look at the project.
The realignment of St. Anne Street behind the courthouse to connect with Taché Street marks the first phase of the downtown area revitalization plan (DARP) and is intended to create better access to the river by creating a new promenade and pavilion.
The motion to stop construction is scheduled to be heard when council meetings resume on Aug. 17.
Russell’s biggest qualm is with the implementation of a roundabout to connect St. Anne Street to the new promenade of the same name.
“What problem or demand are we solving? There is no demand,” he said, pointing to the future roundabout’s proximity to three different traffic lights along St. Anne Street.
“You’re no sooner through it until you’re on Sir Winston Churchill and Grandin,” he said.
Russell questions whether the project would have been approved in its current form had councillors known exactly what they were voting for.
According to the city’s capital projects manager Sue Howard, council likely only saw the design concepts for the realignment at the public open house.
“I would not have voted for DARP myself,” Russell said. “Most of downtown is privately owned. I think we can do some things to help them out, but $4.2 million for a road that goes nowhere to nowhere? There are lots of other things that need to be done in this city.”
Howard said that design decisions are typically left to the engineering department’s discretion and that a lot more roundabouts will be coming St. Albert’s way in the future, as it gets added to the city’s engineering standards.
“It’s becoming a lot more popular in certain transportation situations,” she said.
“When we looked at whether we were going to put signals, leave it with a stop sign or put in a roundabout, we looked at a whole pile of quantitative and qualitative measures and came up with a score … The roundabout was the safest, it allowed the most traffic through and the cost was pretty neutral compared to a signalized intersections.”
Howard also pointed out that the city is looking to future demand, given that the Amacon development will add a number of new residents to the area.
The project had fallen behind schedule by about two weeks due to soil issues and problems with realigning the water mains, but is still expected to be complete by September. Crews are also set to start pregrading for the new roundabout, said Howard.
New home for farmers’ market?
Russell also wants to see the St. Albert Farmers’ Market, currently held in front of city hall on Saturdays from June to October, permanently moved to the promenade and adjacent pavilion at Millennium Park once it is constructed.
“What city would shut down on a Saturday?” he said. “We have retail businesses open on Saturdays. They’re not doing any business because no one can park.”
Ana Calado, from the newly established Vinyl Rock CafĂ© on Perron Street, said that moving the farmers’ market to Millenium Park would have an isolating effect on local downtown businesses.
“It would take away from the traffic here,” Calado said. “If (people) are pulled into there they probably wouldn’t have any reason to come on to the street.”
While market days are the cafĂ©’s busiest, the same cannot be said for some retailers or destination shops, which cite a consistent reduction in the number of regular customers during the 17-week period.
“I think the market is a good asset to St. Albert, but not to the businesses in the downtown core,” said Cerulean co-owner Kelsey Bulmer. “It’s taken our busiest day of the year and made it our slowest, by making it inaccessible to our clients.”
Cal Howard, owner of Wine Kitz, is concerned that the largest market in Western Canada has outgrown its current location on St. Anne Street, especially given the future narrowing of the roadway, among other downtown revitalization projects.
“It’s going to inhibit people from coming to downtown St. Albert on Saturdays,” said Howard, who already loses 20 per cent of his Saturday business while the farmers’ market is on due to lack of parking and traffic problems.
Chamber of Commerce CEO Lynda Moffat said she could not comment on the implications of a potential change in location, stating that a detailed impact study needs to be conducted, but said she did not think Coun. Russell understood the magnitude of the market on St. Albert’s economy.
Moffat plans to speak against the motion on Aug. 17, as the chamber strongly supports the DARP in its entirety, including the realignment of St. Anne Street.
While the city is asking the market to move from its current location to St. Anne Promenade next year to facilitate construction, Guy Boston, the city’s executive director of economic development, said that a permanent relocation would need to be looked at in collaboration with the chamber.
He said he would urge more discussions if council were to decide on Aug. 17 that the market needs a new home.
