Our family and many others in the Florence Lake area will soon lose our only way to safely cross the Trans Canada Highway at Spencer Road, as described in the article in the May 15 News Gazette. This is a very busy crosswalk and is used daily by Spencer students, local residents walking and biking to downtown Langford, and others accessing the up-Island buses that pick up and drop off passengers on the TCH in front of the Shell gas station. The City of Langford told residents that the cost of construction of a pedestrian overpass would be $1.4 million; this figure has now jumped to $2 million and Langford says it cannot afford it at this time. The city told residents that they will have to walk to the Millstream or Leigh Road overpasses to cross the TCH. This will be a significant inconvenience for those of us on the north side of the highway who will now have a detour of nearly a kilometre, but more importantly, it will be a serious safety concern. It is highly unlikely that everyone who needs to cross the highway at Spencer Road will walk the extra distance to the Millstream or Leigh Road overpasses. They will cross where they always have, even though the eight lanes of traffic at that spot will make Spencer Road a very dangerous place to cross the highway.
We urge the city to build a pedestrian overpass at Spencer Road.
The city could ask the property developers on the north side of the TCH to pay for this amenity, since they are the major beneficiaries of the Leigh Road interchange. Current residents in the Florence Lake area will be negatively affected.
Ron Rayner
Langford