This week, the Houston government finally released the long-awaited Regional Transportation Plan (RPT) along with their own Action Plan in response.
Ultimately, much of the RTP recommends investigating or exploring ideas further, so the real test of the plan will be determined by where the province chooses to invest and who is at the table. The EAC is concerned that the province’s Action Plan includes actions that directly contradict the RTP’s evidence-based recommendations.
The foundation of the RTP itself is good overall. It offers a comprehensive and balanced overview of transportation in the Halifax region while acknowledging that business as usual – an over reliance on single occupancy vehicles and building more roads – won't solve our congestion issues. The team behind the RTP should also be commended for the wide-reaching engagement done in the creation of this report. It included diverse voices often left out of similar plans, including African Nova Scotian, First Nation, rural, disabled, youth, immigrant and more. It was also formatted to work directly with underserved communities and involved multiple public engagement sessions.
We are particularly happy to see:
- Emphasis on transit, including inter-municipal transit services, on-demand transit and increased ferry options
- The importance of walking, rolling and cycling, and the acknowledgement that social stigma and the perception of a lack of safety prevents most people from choosing transit or active transportation options
- A recommendation to create a Regional Transportation Management Centre to improve traffic flow
- The inclusion of High Occupancy Vehicle lanes (if applied without increasing lanes or impacting transit priority lanes)
- A defined equity lens for planning
- The recommendation to create an active transportation bridge across the Northwest Arm
What we aren’t happy to see:
In the RTP it notes: "on a per capita basis, Nova Scotia has one of the highest densities of roads in Canada." Many of the suggestions are focused on increasing road capacity for vehicles and maintaining current infrastructure, which is simply not economical. This approach is outdated and extremely expensive. Additional road capacity should be approached only if absolutely necessary (i.e., only after transit and other alternatives have been exhausted). This includes a Hammonds Plains Road to Highway 101 connector, a third bridge crossing (unless this is specifically for AT and transit) and the Shearwater and Beaver Bank connectors.
Concerns with the province's Action Plan:
Our main concerns come not from the RTP itself, but the province’s Action Plan in response to the RTP.
The Action Plan suggests “reviewing active transportation projects to preserve existing road capacity,” which would pause all active transportation projects already underway in the HRM. The RTP clearly notes that active transportation is an important piece of the puzzle in reducing single occupancy vehicle usage and important coupled with transit for first and last mile portions of trips. Nowhere in the report does it recommend that current or planned active transportation projects be paused or reviewed. It’s very rare that active transportation projects impact road capacity meaningfully. Building out a connected network – particularly on the peninsula – is fundamental to transportation mode shift and reducing vehicle congestion. Viewing active transportation projects as causing congestion has no foundational evidence. In situations where road capacity is impacted by active transportation projects, such as Morris Street, years of reports, analysis and consolation have been done to find the best possible proposals.
The government’s Action Plan also indicates a plan to move forward with a Hammonds Plains Road to Highway 101 connector – framing it as an emergency egress route that will also service the Sandy Lake "Special Planning Area." There is no recommendation in the RTP for the Sandy Lake development, and it should be noted that the development is part of a provincial political agenda. The Houston government needs to be transparent on whether there is evidence to support a large road to this Special Planning Area, the ecological impacts of the development and the potential increase in traffic congestion that would come with contributing to urban sprawl.
The EAC’s recommendations:
We are calling on the Houston government to:
- Reverse the “review” of active transportation projects, recognize that active transportation helps relieve congestion even if it might reduce road capacity in some areas and follow the RTP’s recommendation to invest and expand active transportation infrastructure
- Provide a cost breakdown of all proposed items in their Action Plan so that taxpayers can compare road, transit and active transportation project costs.
- Provide traffic modelling and rationale for any major new roads and highways proposed by the RTP report or the province’s Action Plan
- Release the Active Transportation Strategy, which was due in 2023