Rumbling from residents may slow the rumble of trucks coming to and from a gravel pit on Thomas Street.
At a public works committee meeting last Thursday, about 15 residents, plus representatives from St. Marys Cement and Canada Building Materials worked with the town to draft new traffic bylaws that will hopefully curb concerns about early morning trucks on Thomas, Park and Wellington streets.
The issue first came to light about two months ago, but as chair of the public works committee Coun. Don Van Galen noted, "there’s been little change."
Since the public works committee, council voted in favour of passing a few new bylaws to quell the noise from the trucks, which have traveled down Thomas Street as early as 4:45 a.m. to load up with gravel from a pit owned by Canada Building Materials (CBM), a division of St. Marys Cement (SMC).
CBM did send the town a letter in July, promising to reduce truck traffic prior to 7 a.m., but the problem, according to Wilson Little, SMC’s director of governmental and regulatory affairs, is that the truckers don’t work for CBM, but for independent trucking firms (limestone for the plant is shipped over via the elevated conveyor belt).
"We can discipline them in certain ways, but we can’t fire them," he explained.
After CBM put suspensions into place for truckers coming before 7 a.m., "things seemed to be better… but weren’t as good as we hoped."
Since July 19, there have been 12 warnings issued, and seven one-week suspensions. According to CBM statistics, between July 19 and Aug. 19, 26 different trucks (not including SMC trucks, which were shipping topsoil to the plant) used the pit daily on average. Seventeen of these 26 trucks were making local deliveries – to Little Falls Public School, Jones Street east (where a water main was being repaired), and Perth Concrete, to name a few.
The nine remaining trucks were hauling for Ministry of Transportation projects in Stratford and Woodstock, said Little. But, as the residents noted, those numbers should be doubled, as each truck had to enter and exit the pit.
CBM has also been keeping tabs on where the trucks are going, and plan to make this data available on a regular basis.
Spring has been very busy for CBM, admittedly, with a peak of 165 trucks per day coming at one point. "It’s a lot of good business for us," admitted Little, ‘but we don’t want the people of St. Marys annoyed at SMC."
Little noted that, while truck traffic headed to London was encouraged to use the River Road to bypass the town, it’s not an ideal alternative as it has poor sight lines, sharp turns, and uses more fuel, which, he explained, is bad for CBM’s carbon footprint.
As for the number of trucks being diverted through to Rannoch – keeping in mind that if they enter that way, they must exit that way – on Aug. 25, the day before the meeting, of 62 trucks total at the pit, 44 went through Rannoch – although this varies daily.
Little’s first suggestion in solving the problem would be to reduce the speed limit on Thomas Street. He had spent the night at the Westover Inn, and went for a walk along Thomas shortly after 7 that morning.
While it was after the suggested time for limiting traffic, he did see a truck and noted that "50 km/h for a large truck on Thomas is probably too fast" at any time of day. "We’d be happy to have (a speed reduction) implemented."
Currently, the entire town is a 50km/h zone, except on Egan Street, due to the proximity of Holy Name of Mary School to the former Dresden plant, where the limit dips to 40km/h.
Amy Brennan, who lives on Thomas, wondered if the proposed 40 km/h speed limit could be reduced to 30 km/h "as people think it’s ok to go 10 km over the limit, anyway."
Doug Fread, another Thomas Street resident, approved of the speed limit reduction, noting that empty trucks were louder than their filled counterparts.
"If you buy a house near an airport, you can’t complain about the planes," he mused.
The change in speed limit would apply to all vehicles using the road, and would be enforced by the OPP. While some residents scoffed at this, Van Galen explained that, if the police services board asked the OPP to heighten their monitoring of the street, they would.
Also, one side of Thomas would be declared no parking, so that trucks would not have to shift gears as much to maneuver around traffic.
The second option for controlling traffic is creating a bylaw to limit truck traffic on Thomas, Wellington and Park streets from 6 p.m. to 7 a.m., save local deliveries.
But since the pit operates from 6 a.m. to 5 p.m., the truck limitation would be from 6 p.m. to 7 a.m. on those streets.
"We’re opening a Pandora’s box, no question," commented Van Galen on the limitation, especially on Wellington Street, which trucks often use for deliveries to the Foodland and the Canadian Tire, for example.
However, Wellington Street residents Roy and Lorraine Winstone were advocates of the limits. Roy noted that on one recent day, he recorded 57 trucks going northbound on his street.
He questioned the road’s ability to withstand the weight – as well as why trucks were using Wellington when there is more vehicle and foot traffic.
"It’s two turns (to get out of town) anyway," he wondered. "Why don’t the trucks use Water Street?"
Winstone’s wife Lorraine added that she’s seen trucks turning onto Wellington from Park actually climb up over the curb. "The roads are not made for trucks this large," she said.
When asked about the condition of the affected streets and the Park Street bridge, interim director of public works Todd Smythe commented that "Thomas Street is holding up amazingly well," as are the other streets in question, thanks to the fact that the weight of these trucks – from 26 to 36 tonnes, depending on size – is dispersed over multiple axles.
Ken Telfer wondered if a community safety zone could be created on Thomas Street, which would double fines. The town currently has one, along James Street South, for the school, and Van Galen said that "it would not be difficult to establish one" along the street.
Although satisfied with the bylaw changes, most residents were fixed on the idea of a bridge. The gravel pit still has 60 years left in its lifespan, and considering this amount of time, the up-front cost would easily amortize itself.
Brennan asked that CBM draw up a five-year plan to build a bridge. She urged the public works committee and CBM to think of the Westover Inn, and the fact that many of its patrons choose the Inn because it is away from big city traffic problems.
With two children of her own, Brennan also wanted CBM to "think of the cost of the quality of life with the cost of a bridge" that would link the pit to Water Street South.
She added that residents "don’t want to be the truck police" every day, monitoring who is legally using the road, and reporting it to CBM or the OPP.
Little explained that a bridge for the pit, which would cross the river to Water Street South, isn’t on the horizon. Considering that gravel sells for around $4 per tonne,  "There’s very little margin – it just isn’t economically feasible to build a bridge," says Little.
The traffic issue on Thomas Street isn’t new; resident Sandra Bannick had a copy of the correspondence that took place a decade ago. "We’re dealing with the same problem we were 10 years ago," she noted. No measures were put in place at that time, however.
For Bannick, "we were discussing a bridge 10 years ago – it could have been done already. Are we going to be waiting another 10 years and still be talking about it?"
Once the bylaws and signage is in place, Van Galen said that the committee would evaluate the changes in about six to eight weeks. But as this range coincides with the slowing of the construction season, it was suggested that next spring would be a better time to review the changes.