Town officials and the Olds and District Chamber of Commerce are in favour of the latest Alberta Transportation plan for moving traffic in and around Olds.
In a fact sheet circulated by Alberta Transportation, which was included in the town council meeting package of April 22, government officials concluded that a bypass around Olds was "ineffective in addressing traffic concerns, unjustifiable in terms of cost-benefit and potentially disruptive to planned local development initiatives.î
"That's good news for the local business community,î said Doug Rieberger, president of the Olds chamber.
The chamber lobbied against the idea of building a bypass when the provincial government was gathering feedback on a functional plan for Highway 27 a few years ago. Rieberger said with the closure of several access points to and from Highway 27 in recent years, he felt the new plan to use Highway 27 for through traffic and arterial roads for local commuters wouldn't make much of an impact on future Highway 27 traffic volumes.
Mayor Judy Dahl said she is happy to see that more people will continue to come through the community as a result of Alberta Transportation's decision.
"The more you can keep people moving through your communities, the healthier it would be for your business core, for sure. And it also might be an eye-opener for travellers and or new visitors,î she said.
Alberta Transportation has also encouraged the town and Mountain View County to develop arterial roads parallel to Highway 27 to take local traffic off the highway wherever possible.
In a traffic count conducted by CastleGlenn Consultants in October 2011, the company found that while about 14,000 vehicles per day used the highway in a specific 12-hour period, fewer than 520 vehicles per day were travelling through the community, meaning the majority of vehicles were local traffic.
"Really, the (proposed) bypass (would be) there for through traffic. And so the consultant starts crunching the numbers of what savings that is in terms of time and fuel weighed against the cost of actually building that bypass. There's not enough traffic that are going through Olds that would justify this huge capital expenditure,î said Russell Watts, infrastructure manager with Alberta Transportation's central region.
In doing the analysis, CastleGlenn concluded that building a bypass around Olds to divert traffic off Highway 27 would save $270,000 caused by traffic delays on the highway.
At the same time, the consultants calculated that it would cost roughly $60 million initially to construct a 10-kilometre bypass route around the community.
"In short, the savings afforded to highway through-traffic in terms of improved travel time and shorter delays were found to be insufficient to offset the costs associated with a highway bypass,î the fact sheet concluded.
Larry Wright, the town's director of operations, said if the town developed more arterial routes to handle local traffic, then Highway 27's lifespan would increase.
"If we work with them and they work with us to keep the traffic circulating, that's really in-town traffic away from the highway, then that will keep Highway 27 much more functional. Instead of a 15-year horizon, probably a 25-year horizon,î he said.
