Hi. The stretch of Interurban Road between Alan Road and Courtland Avenue is dangerous, with blind s-curves and two hills, and often covered in mud and gravel from industrial operations on Alan Road.  What used to be a little-used rural backroad, Interurban Road is now a major artery. Speeding traffic around the curves makes pedestrian crossing a real hazard, while at other times of the day traffic backs up all the way from the light at Wilkinson and Interurban to Courtland and beyond towards Camosun College, making turns onto and off of Courtland Avenue a challenge.

To address this we, the neighbours of Courtland Avenue and area, request the following fixes:

1. A marked crosswalk with a pedestrian activated flashing beacon at Courtland and Interurban as it’s a dangerous intersection to walk across especially with children
2. A sign and markings for vehicles to not block the intersection at Courtland and Interurban
3. Get the bus stop out of the mud pit (the one between Alan and Courtland on the west side). Either move it up or pave/gravel the current location
4. The road is usually a mess. Mud and gravel cover the road and sometimes quite large rocks that damage cars. The operator should clean up the street and bike lanes and have facilities on their premises to mitigate the mess on Interurban, perhaps tire washers, a clean road base, transport material to clean loading areas, or other methods. We have noticed that Alan Road was cleaned up and newly paved with asphalt on Sunday, October 31, 2021. Let’s hope that that helps keep Interurban clean, however, we have noticed that the mud and dirt is starting to creep up towards Interurban since then. Also we appreciate that Saanich cleans the mud, dirt, and gravel off Interurban, however, there is so much that it only takes a few days to clog back up.
5. If the street can’t be kept clean then post a warning sign to alert vehicles that bikes will be merging with traffic, that is, put up a “bikes can take the lane” sign. Many of the neighbours notice that bikes already have to take the road and most drivers are pretty understanding.
6. The trees planted as part of the landscaping for the newly installed wastewater pumping station at Courtland Avenue, largely block the left hand view of oncoming car and bike traffic. Not an ideal situation. It has been noted by one neighbour that it appears to violate Saanich bylaw 9487 regarding sight lines at intersections. Also, every couple of weeks, work trucks park there as they work on the pump station, further blocking the sight lines.
7. Finish paving the corner and move the stop sign. Currently the right hand turn is too sharp. An asphalt grinder prepared the road after the pump station work however a portion of the road was not re-paved. One can still see the grinder marks on the corner that was not re-paved and instead gravel was put down. Please finish the pavement, make the corner rounder as it was before, and move the stop sign over.
8. Also as part of landscaping for the new wastewater pumping station, the shoulders of Interurban were covered with dirt rather than replaced with gravel as they used to be. Now the shoulders are mud pits and mud is tracked onto Interurban including from the two bus stops, one left of Courtland (towards Alan), and the other right (at Charlton Rd).
9. Finally, we feel that given two plus years of having to put up with the construction of the wastewater pumping station (the poop pump) at Courtland Avenue and now having to live with that station, the negative impacts of continued industrial operations on Alan Road, and the increasing traffic in the region, we feel these “amenities” are the least that can be done!!
    

Yours truly,

The Neighbours of Courtland Ave and Area