Phil Craft stands where he and other Jackpine Lane residents want a gate to be installed. A gate would block an area where the lane bottlenecks and turns into a wider street off of Tamarack Drive. The speed limit in the lane is 20 km/h, but Craft said he has seen drivers go as fast as 80 km/h. Photo by Tasleem Mawji - Click on picture for large image
OSOYOOS TIMES-December 1, 2010
By Tasleem Mawji – Osoyoos Times
Jackpine Lane might get a locked gate to stop people from speeding down the narrow laneway behind Maple Drive.
Residents of the area have united to sign a petition to have the Town of Osoyoos install speed bumps after a few close calls with speeding vehicles, including a resident’s two Chihuahuas being run over by a car.
Being quite small, the dogs fit under the body of the car and were not hurt.
Phil Craft, who lives on Jackpine Lane and organized the petition for the speed bumps in July, said he lost his son to a car accident in the past and is concerned for the safety of his grandchildren and everyone else in that area.
“It’s just got so dangerous; it’s absolutely incredible that someone has not got killed.”
“We’ve been out front there when there were people that were airborne coming from Cottonwood (Drive). You holler at them – doesn’t make a heck of a difference; they don’t care,” Craft said, adding that drivers sometimes reach speeds of up to 80 km/h.
Several of the 36 residents who signed the petition presented their case to Mayor Stu Wells and Osoyoos council at the community of the whole meeting on Nov. 22.
The discussion was supposed to take place in October, but the group asked for more time so they could put together a presentation.
Coun. Michael Ryan said the presentation was well done and that the issue was well-received by council.
“They seemed to get a very sympathetic hearing from council on the idea of a gate,” said Ryan, who visited Craft earlier in the week to see the lane.
While the group had initially petitioned for speed bumps, Craft wrote another letter on Nov. 9 to council proposing the idea of a gate after concerns about the proposed speed bumps came up.
A report to council from Ron Doucette, the Town’s director of operational services, reads: “Speed bumps are not a viable solution to slowing down traffic. Not only are they a maintenance problem but, more importantly, they are a safety and liability concern to the ambulance services and the fire department.”
Another report stated that all requests for speed bumps had been denied in the past.
Craft said the issue of ambulances and fire trucks having trouble reaching certain areas because of speed bumps had been resolved because no emergency vehicles use Jackpine Lane.
He said only a few houses face the laneway, whereas most front onto Maple Drive.
He also said the lane is narrow and vehicles are frequently parked in ways that would make the street inaccessible anyway, but added that it seemed that a gate was the most likely solution to the problem of vehicles speeding through the lane.
“Everybody agreed that there had to be something done,” said John DeLaere another resident of Jackpine Lane who was present at the Nov. 22 meeting. “Council (is) going to talk it over as to whether they (are) going to put speed bumps in or gate it off permanently.”
The issue will be taken to council at its next regular meeting, which is Dec. 6.
If the gate or speed bumps are approved by council, the work will likely take place in the spring depending on the weather.
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