“The County of Barrhead has heard no response to their inquiry regarding high-tension cable barriers along Highway 18, which has many local residents worried that it will impact traffic,” says county manager Mark Oberg.
During their July 26 meeting, county council had previously directed administration to send a letter to Alberta Transportation asking why the barriers were set up and the reasoning behind it.
Since then, Oberg said the county office has been inundated with calls from angry residents regarding the high-tension cable barriers.
“If you’re an agricultural producer, or you have any kind of wide load whatsoever — I’m thinking of the folks at Northplex — you’re going to end up having to travel down the middle of the road because of these barriers,” Oberg said.
Reeve Bill Lee said he agrees with the residents’ concerns, adding there’s little the county can do.
“We haven’t heard back from the highways and there isn’t much we can do about this issue until we get some information back,” Lee said.
He added that Barrhead-Morinville-Westlock MLA Glenn van Dijken is fielding similar calls from displeased constituents.
“He is collecting his own information, but doesn’t have it all together yet either,” he said, adding the installation of these high-tension cable barriers seems to be occurring across the province.
“I’ve seen some correspondence regarding the moving of product from Northplex, and I know it is now much more difficult for them as well,” Oberg said. “We generally think solely of the farmers as being affected, but anybody with a wide load who is on the low-side, this is going to affect them too.”
Public Works deputy superintendant Ken Hove agreed.
“Last week, I saw two different people stopped who were complaining about these things because of a cyclist being in there,” Hove said, adding even if the cyclist in question is between the barrier and the white line, motorists still have to reduce speeds more so than they would have to.
“Even cyclists stay away from the guard-rails,” he said.
“We’re going to have to wait until we hear back from the department of highways before we can proceed,” Lee said. “I am getting calls from very concerned, very mad people, and some of our other councillors are also dealing with this issue. The old barriers were farther from the edge of the driving surface and they were shorter in height, and there’s a really big difference between the two.”
Coun. Bill Lane said while he can see the benefits of having HTCBs on roads such as Highway 2, or other multi-lane highways, but failed to see the importance of having them on Highway 18.
“It makes sense on Highway 2, but not on a road like this. You hit something like this, you’re going to be bounced right back into the other lane,” he added.
In a seperate interview Albert Van Raalte, service manager at Northplex Ltd., said the location and design of the cables impedes the delivery of homes down Highway 18.
“As they are currently installed, we have to find alternate routes to deliver the homes destined in that direction,” Van Raalte said, adding this in turn has increased the cost of transport for customers, the amount of time such homes are in-transit, as well as the risks associated with such deliveries.
“Along with the issues it creates for us as a business, I personally see a significant safety issue with the current system being used,” he said. “If a vehicle were to lose control in those areas in the past, they would land in the ditch with a minimal amount of risk for damage. Now however, if they hit the barrier, motorists risk having the vehicle written off by the impact and also, potentially, being rebounded into the lane of oncoming traffic.”
The Leader asked Alberta Transportation for a comment, but as of press deadline it was not received.
