Despite resident pleas, downtown 4-way stops are no more

Earlier this year council had concurred with staff recommendations to only have "temporary stop signs" added on Main street.

In June, council had discussions regarding adding stop signs downtown Sturgeon Falls. Councillor Daniel Gagne brought forward a motion asking that 4-way stop signs be added at Main and William as well as Main and Queen. Gagne stressed that he had received many requests from residents and business owners citing the intersections as unsafe.

But at the time, staff did not support Gagne’s request. The Director of Infrastructure, Elizabeth Henning stressed that the Ontario Traffic Manual only recommends 4-way stops when roadways have more than 200 vehicles/hour. In 2023, traffic counts for these intersections were only 160 vehicles/hour.

All other councillors sided with staff’s recommendations and passed on the proposal. But staff ultimately decided that due to the planned increased traffic this summer downtown because of the construction projects, that temporary 4-way signs could be put in place.

It appears most residents enjoyed the added stop signs this summer. On Thursday the municipality announced that these 4-way stops would be removed on November 4th. Many quickly came to the defence of the traffic signs. Within hours, over 100 people had commented almost exclusively asking that the municipality leave the stop signs there.

Many longtime residents pointed out that the sightlines at these intersections have always needed extra stops. Some stating how happy they were to finally see these signs erected but are now shocked that they would now be removed.

Council is scheduled to meet on the day after these signs are scheduled to be removed. The topic is not on the agenda as of now, but councillors can choose to add items with majority support.

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