Traffic lights are installed and operating at the intersection of the Trans-Canada Highway and Eagle Butte Road in Dunmore, a location that has been the scene of a number of collisions and fatalities in the past.--NEWS PHOTO GILLIAN SLADE
gslade@medicinehatnews.com@MHNGillianSlade
The intersection of Trans-Canada Highway and Eagle Butte Road in Dunmore, where a number of serious collisions occurred over the years, now has traffic lights.
“I think it’s going to be a huge benefit …,” said Cypress County Deputy Reeve Richard Oster. “I’m quite pleased that they’ve been finally installed. It was a long struggle to get everything in place. Of course we never anticipated it would be this many years to do it.”
Turning lanes had to be taken into account, which added to the scale and design of the project, he said.
Safety was a major issue at the intersection. Oster says school bus drivers reported taking a longer route to avoid it, as did those students able to drive themselves.
Oster says on top of that a developer was planning to build a number of new homes in the area. Cypress County council calculated how many additional vehicles it would mean for the intersection even if there were only two vehicles per home initially.
TCH is a provincial road so Alberta Transportation had to be on board with the traffic lights and the cost of the project was shared.
“They did partner with us and they were on board all the way,” said Oster.
John Belanger, county director of corporate services, says the total cost was $1.2 million, with Alberta Transportation contributing $400,000, and the balance coming from municipal reserves.
Drew Barnes, MLA for Cypress-Medicine Hat has previously talked about the collision prone area.
“Planning, construction and financial partnerships to ensure Albertans receive the infrastructure, safety and growth required are essential,” said Barnes. “I am pleased Cypress County’s representatives managed their finances and their priorities in such a way that the taxpayers of Cypress could partner with Alberta Transportation to make this happen.”
The intersection is one of the main crossroads for the community with Eagle Butte Road leading to a school. There is a Co-op gas bar on one corner and transport trucks use the intersection to access the light industrial area and the Richardson Pioneer elevator.
For a long time residents had raised concerns about the intersection. By 2006 there had been three fatal collisions in the previous two years.
At that stage Alberta Transportation felt the volume of traffic did not warrant traffic lights on a major highway. Very large stop signs were then installed and the speed limited reduced to 80 km/h through the hamlet.
In August 2017 there was a fatal collision a few kilometres further along where Highway 41 N and Township Road 120 intersect with the TCH.
In 2017 a spokesperson for Alberta Transportation said there was a recommendation to have a Medicine Hat bypass in the future to the south of the city, with the junction being east of Highway 41 N but that is planned for two or three decades down the road.
