ESQUIMALT: TRAFFIC
Transit and transportation will have to take centre stage in Esquimalt in the new year, specifically moving traffic through the Admirals Road corridor, says Mayor Barb Desjardins.
"We, as a region, have to get a handle on it, and we are in the process in Esquimalt of having major impacts in terms of increases to a very narrow corridor coming into Esquimalt, which is coming to Dockyard and the base [CFB Esquimalt]," Desjardins said.
It's difficult to gauge how much of an impact a recent change to base standing orders reducing the number of people allowed to stagger their hours has affected the situation, Desjardins said. Regardless, with the growth of the shipbuilding industry at Seaspan, there is going to be more and more pressure on the corridor, she said.
"That addresses the whole regional West Shore to downtown stuff, too. Everybody funnels in and a lot of them drop off here in Esquimalt so we as a community have to be responsive to that but we can't do it by ourselves. We have to do it regionally," she said.
"That, to me is probably the most important thing for our region because we are losing productivity. And when we lose productivity, that is not good for the region."
Desjardins noted it is also Esquimalt's 100th anniversary this year and the municipality hopes to ring it in well.
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