Residents on the Oak Bay and Saanich border still seek action on an intersection they deem dangerous.
It’s where Beach Drive meets Cadboro Bay Road, which looks like a simple Y intersection – but there’s more to it.
Drivers on Beach heading north toward Saanich approach the intersection on an incline and drivers on Cadboro Bay Road heading in the same direction are travelling downhill and into a curve. Drivers on Beach face a stop sign with flashing red lights – the animated traffic sign is among recent improvements to engage road-users better.
Complicating things, at the right of the Beach Road stop sign, Hibbons Close meets Cadboro Bay Road. Hibbons also marks the municipal border with Saanich, which is why residents from both communities formed the Oak Bay Community Safety Network to seek improvements at the intersection.
“It’s a very complex, nasty intersection,” spokesperson Curby Klaibert said. “This can’s been kicked down the road for 27 years, how long does a community have to wait in order to get some positive solution on how we’re going to make this intersection safe?”
In 1996, Ramsay Murray, a trained traffic engineer, presented his pitch of a roundabout to both councils. Murray died in March 2022 but the group continues to rely on his documented concerns.
Over the years, they’ve asked for numerous improvements, including sidewalks, crosswalks and a roundabout.
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“He was suggesting a roundabout – now that’s 27 years ago and … no changes of significance have been made,” Klaibert said.
“People coming off Beach Drive read this as an onramp to a freeway. They’re concerned about looking to their left. … They look for an opening and just take off without ever looking to their right.”
He argues cyclists don’t stop and many vehicle drivers also roll through the intersection.
The network lobbied successfully for Saanich to put a sidewalk on its side of the border, but don’t feel Oak Bay has done anything “of substance” to improve safety in the block.
Today, the group seeks a report, primarily because they thought was on the books for Oak Bay, Klaibert said. This spring, he contacted the engineering department in hopes of an update and learned a study wasn’t in the budget.
“I felt six years of hard work with Oak Bay got torpedoed,” he said. “I think they need to be aware … I don’t live too far from here and I hear the horns constantly blaring because there’s lots of confrontation at this intersection – lots of near accidents and lots of accidents.”