A group of Coquitlam residents fed up with what they say are reckless drivers and teeming traffic at the base of the Coquitlam Crunch has launched a petition directed at city council.
In violation of both parking bylaws and rules of the road, residents say visitors to the popular destination whip U-turns into their driveways, hurl verbal abuse at residents and use their driveways as parking spots and staging grounds to meet up with friends or eat lunch.
“Since COVID started we’ve had non-stop traffic in front of our homes… our neighbour’s child was almost hit,” said petition organizer and resident Andrea Huszar-Wolff.
Resident and father Sean Miller said there has been such an increase in traffic along Lansdowne Drive in the last couple of years that he fears for the safety of his three children playing in their driveway.
“Both my sons have almost been hit by drivers doing U-turns into my driveway,” said Miller in an email. “During one occasion the driver yelled at my son to move so that he could do his U-turn and when my 11-year-old son didn’t move in time he started swearing at him.”
Several residents have set up cones in their driveways as a temporary deterrent Huszar-Wolff said is often ignored. She said she contacted mayor Richard Stewart as well as Coquitlam’s engineering department, but has yet to receive a satisfactory answer beyond “we are building a parking lot.”
But Coquitlam Mayor Richard Stewart told the Tri-City News that he has been pushing the city’s engineering department to find solutions to the traffic problem on the street and understands the residents’ frustration.
“I’ve seen it myself. The sum total is a lot of three-point turns into peoples’ driveways,” he said. “There’s work to be done. No question.”
Stewart said he last spoke to city staff regarding the problem Friday, Aug. 15, and that they are looking at solutions.
“We’re all trying to balance the need to make sure residents have places to exercise their physical and mental health. Are we going to make mistakes? Yes,” he said, adding that many of Coquitlam’s neighbourhoods, from the Coquitlam River to Crystal Falls, is coping with a spike in traffic.
Still, said Stewart, “I want to improve how we’re responding to those neighbours.”
Huszar-Wolff is adamant that as the city moves ahead with its recent approval of the first phase in a five-year, $7 million Coquitlam Crunch upgrade project, improving traffic safety needs to be prioritized.
“This residential street cannot handle the volume today and it certainly can’t handle the volume after a $7 million in upgrades,” she said.
Huszar-Wolff acknowledges part of the uptick in traffic is due to the pandemic as people head outside in search of safe activities. But she also said she’s frustrated by the city’s recent promotion of the Coquitlam Crunch in several Metro Vancouver-wide publications.
“They need to build the infrastructure first then promote it as a recreational site. Now they’re playing catchup,” Huszar-Wolff said. “I can’t believe they are so dismissive of us and yet they’re promoting this everywhere.”
The petition is calling on the city to install “No U-turn” signs before and after the entrance to the Coquitlam Crunch to remind drivers not to veer sharply into residents’ driveways and to allow for the free flow of traffic up and down Lansdowne Drive.
“All we’re asking for are signs,” she said. “At least it’s a deterrent.”
