The Bronson Team tackles safety

Bronson Avenue traffic safety issues are persistent. The Bronson Team is working on improvements to be implemented when the long-postponed Bronson reconstruction takes place.

PHOTO: BARB POPEL

The Bronson Team tackles safety

By Barbara Popel

Death, taxes and Bronson Avenue traffic safety issues are inevitable. Or are they? Earlier this year, several Glebe residents from both sides of Bronson formed the Bronson Team to tackle the road’s safety issues between the Queensway and the Rideau Canal. Our goals are to improve safety for all pedestrians, transit users and cyclists and to improve the health of Glebe residents who live on and near Bronson and must endure the street’s noise, fumes and pollution.

The Bronson Team was formed when, as chair of the Dow’s Lake Residents Association (DLRA) Traffic Committee, I approached James Stuewe and Matt Meagher, the co-chairs of the Glebe Community Association (GCA) Transportation Committee, about forming a team to improve Bronson safety. Stuewe and Meagher agreed. Then I approached Sue Stefko of the Glebe Annex Community Association (GACA), and she also agreed to join. We’re pleased that our tripartite team, which currently has eight members, represents residents on both sides of Bronson.

Our team is working on an extensive draft document. In it, the team proposes a wide range of potential solutions that could partially address various Bronson safety and health issues such as traffic, speeding, traffic violations, and air and noise pollution. Solutions came from past public consultations and a wide variety of publications on topics such as traffic calming and pedestrian-friendly streets. We’ve separated these solutions into two categories – solutions which the City of Ottawa could implement immediately and solutions which could only be implemented when the City redevelops Bronson from the Queensway to the Rideau Canal.

Our first focus is on potential immediate solutions. Our current draft document describes 26 that focus on reducing traffic speeds, improving pedestrian safety and enhancing transit usage. Among the proposals: designating that stretch of Bronson as a Community Safety Zone; install photo radar and red-light cameras; add “leading pedestrian intervals” of seven to 10 seconds at crosswalks and increase crossing times; add school crossing guards at Bronson and Madawaska. Other ideas will be fine-tuned and made public later.

We are hoping to get formal feedback on these potential immediate solutions from people who live on or near Bronson by later this year or early 2024. After we consider residents’ feedback, we’ll engage with Councillor Shawn Menard and City staff.

Then we’ll turn our attention to refining the potential solutions that could only be implemented during Bronson redevelopment. There are 17 such potential solutions in the current draft document. They address the same issues as the potential immediate solutions but require structural changes to Bronson such as wider sidewalks and redesigned intersections.

This is where things get “interesting.”

The first phase of Bronson redevelopment was done north of the Queensway a few years ago with replacement of water mains, sewers and sidewalks. Bronson from the Queensway to the Rideau Canal is long overdue for the same kind of redevelopment. Those of you who have lived in the neighbourhood for at least a decade may remember that back in 2015, there was a team called the Bronson Public Advisory Committee (BPAC). Its members were from the GCA, the DLRA and the GACA. Ecology Ottawa assisted the committee. BPAC published the “Bronson Reconstruction & Revisioning Report” which was intended as input to the city’s plan to redevelop Bronson in 2016. But that project was postponed. Now in 2023, it’s “plus ça change, plus c’est la même chose.” Last year, we were told that Bronson reconstruction was scheduled to start in 2024, but this year the start date was pushed out yet again. Digging up Bronson might start in 2027, though the actual date is still up in the air.

However, the Bronson Team will be ready! We want to present our ideas to our councillor and to the City before the detailed design work begins and well before the digging starts.

If you live on Bronson or in the vicinity of Bronson between the Queensway and the Rideau Canal, you’ll be hearing from the Bronson Team soon.

Barb Popel is the team leader of the Bronson Team and chairperson of the Dow’s Lake Residents Association’s Traffic Committee and secretary of the DLRA. She has lived in the Glebe for 32 years.