A traffic-calming pilot project in Moody Centre will be installed to keep commuter traffic on St. Johns Street.
The Port Moody project will see a traffic choker placed on St. George Street at Kyle Street that will force eastbound traffic on St. George to turn left on Kyle. Area residents would have to navigate home via St. Andrews Street while it's hoped commuters would head back to St. Johns.
Several traffic-calming measures have already been introduced throughout Moody Centre based on information gleaned from four area traffic studies, including traffic circles, speed bumps and medians.
Chokers had been installed at Douglas and Elgin streets (two and three blocks west of Kyle) but complaints from local residents and businesses prompted the city to remove them in 2008, according to a report from the transportation committee. Feedback had indicated the chokers weren't improving traffic on the residential streets and were also restricting access for homes and the businesses on St. Johns that access from St. Andrews.
But city staff have since received requests from residents for additional traffic-calming measures, with the transportation committee suggesting in its 2013 work plan the addition of diverters on St. George.
Three traffic-calming options in the 2007 Moody Centre traffic-calming study ranged from minimal to significant interventions but a survey showed there was little support for the more disruptive changes.
Staff noted that while chokers can successfully limit commuter cut-through - or rat-running - traffic, it can also restrict access for residents and simply push traffic on to other local streets as well as creating new wayfinding challenges for non-local residents and hampering emergency routes.
With significant changes anticipated for Moody Centre over the next several years, PoMo council also passed a recommendation to reconsider additional traffic-calming measures for the area once the impacts of the Evergreen Line and Murray-Clarke corridor are known.
