The 3 traffic problems in eastern NDG that the MUHC traffic from the 15 south can conflict with are:
The MUHC traffic plan, with its new exit from the 15 south planned for summer 2006 at Addington and de Maisonneuve, perfectly avoids the first problem by going under Sherbrooke (with its current 1180 vehicles per evening rush hour total in both directions), but only at the expense of exacerbating the second two. If the new exit went high up into the air and over de Maisonneuve, the train tracks, the 15, Prud'Homme and then Decarie St. right into the hospital grounds, it would avoid all these problems, but at a major expense.
So instead, it immediately recreates at the new light at Addington and newly 2-way de Maisonneuve the heavy traffic problem it avoids at Sherbrooke, as all those hospital-bound vehicles will have to turn left across the path of the current 931 NDG commuters per evening rush hour coming along de Maisonneuve west (note that Girouard, the alternative route to the hospital, goes under de Maisonneuve as well as the tracks).
And then recreates the traffic problem again when those same hospital-bound vehicles will have to turn right across the narrowed mouth of Upper Lachine Road (currently used by 500 vehicles per evening rush hour total in both directions)to get onto newly 2-way Decarie St. south to the hospital.
And then recreates the problem again a third time at 2 new intersections along Decarie St. when those same hospital-bound vehicles will have to turn left to get into the hospital grounds, again across the path of the 1030 homebound NDG commuters per evening rush hour that currently use Decarie St. northward.
Moreover, this third problem gets worse as the traffic leaving the hospital for the expensive entrance to the 15 north from St-Jacques (planned for 2007) has to turn left across the path of both these traffic flows at the entrance/exits to the hospital along Decarie St. If this traffic could leave the hospital by an underground tunnel that fed directly into the 15 north, this problem would be solved, but at even greater expense.
Next it creates a fourth problem as these hospital leaving vehicles turn right onto St-Jacques from Decarie St. to get to the new entrance to the 15 north and delay the 908 current vehicles per evening rush hour going straight west on St-Jacques (most to Cavendish or Westminster).
Finally, a fifth and biggest traffic problem: the plan calls for the underground service entrance for all staff and suppliers to be built from St-Jacques right after the exit from the 20 west joins it, backing up 2573 vehicles per evening rush hour (total both directions on St-Jacques)! A tunnel entrance under busy St-Jacques to quiet Pullman was suggested, but the MUHC planners deemed it too expensive.
The scariest thing is that Michael Applebaum and Marcel Tremblay have publicly stated in The Gazette that we must rush ahead with the construction of the new ramp at Addington in order to keep the Shriner's hospital in Montreal. Please keep the Shriners in Montreal by starting construction of the Shriners hospital!
This traffic plan will affect NDG for generations to come, so let's really think it through before building it, and not let short-term political considerations like which department of which level of government (in this case Transport Quebec) currently has a bit of spare money to get something, anything, started.
This way of proceeding is a recipe for disaster and cost overruns. For once, why don't we get the plan right from the start so we don't wake up 5 years from now having spent hundreds of millions of dollars implementing and then correcting a deeply flawed plan.
Links of interest:
Association des Résidants de CDN-NDG/CDN-NDG Residents' Association
Le Conseil communautaire Notre-Dame-de-Grâce/NDG Community Council
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Updated: 08/04/2007