The uncontrolled intersection appears to be going the way of the dodo bird in Estevan.
Earlier this week, it was announced that the Estevan Police Service would be receiving nearly $36,000 through the proceeds of photo speed enforcement (PSE) to start the process of phasing out the uncontrolled intersections in the city.
The money is generated through photo radar tickets in the province, proving that yes, something positive can come out of photo radar.
The demise of the uncontrolled intersection in Estevan and other Saskatchewan cities is long overdue. If you’re from this area, and if you grow up with uncontrolled intersections, and are trained to drive with them in mind, then they likely make perfect sense to you.
You know how to handle the intersection of Arthur Avenue and Eva Street.
So you can probably think of other areas where we can spend traffic safety money in Estevan, such as a way to improve traffic and pedestrian flow in that horrible junction of 13th Avenue, Souris Avenue North and King Street.
Uncontrolled intersections are also fine for rural roads that only have a few vehicles per day, or in small towns where there isn’t a lot of traffic.
Those statements don’t describe Estevan.
But for those who are from out of town, and who didn’t grow up with the uncontrolled intersection, it’s an accident waiting to happen.
If you’re driving in one of the areas in which they’re prevalent, such as Hillside, and you aren’t from here, and you’re not familiar with the uncontrolled intersection, you might be driving on Eva Street, not see a stop or yield sign, and expect that you have right of way, while those on Arthur Avenue have to stop.
You don’t realize that it’s uncontrolled until it’s too late.
I’m from B.C. originally. We don’t have uncontrolled intersections. I didn’t encounter one until I moved out here. The good news for me was that my mom is from southeast Saskatchewan originally, so I received a quick lesson on procedure when I moved here. There were a few in the Westview subdivision, where I lived upon moving to Estevan, so I had a few chances to practice right away.
The numbers from the Estevan Police Service show there were 291 accidents at uncontrolled intersections from 2013-17. Now, you have to wonder how many of those accidents were caused by people who didn’t know an uncontrolled intersection was coming or didn’t know how to handle one because they haven’t seen them before.
And you have to wonder how many of them were caused by a lack of driver attention, stupidity or over-aggressiveness.
You can be sure that there were accidents that would have been prevented if there had been a stop sign in place.
Estevan has a lot of uncontrolled intersections. Eighty of them, to be exact. They’re all over the community, too. It’s not like they’re just clustered into one subdivision.
There’s so many of them that the money the city received from the photo radar fund only remedies about half of the 80 problems. The remaining uncontrolled intersections will have to wait for another time.
The police chief says they’re going to install stop signs at the most troublesome intersections, where the highest volume of accidents has occurred.
You have to wonder who thought uncontrolled intersections were a good idea for cities to begin with. Did they come along before stop signs were created?
Were they created as a cost-cutting measure to reduce money spent on stop signs?
Did someone actually think that they would one day replace the stop sign and the traffic light as the preferred means of controlling traffic at intersections?
Even traffic circles make more sense than them.
You can just imagine the conversation when the first uncontrolled intersection was introduced. Someone suggests that no stop signs are better than two or four such signs. Everyone at the table agrees. After all, motorists will adapt. And those who haven’t encountered these intersections before will know exactly how to handle them when they approach them.
Maybe they thought it would be the wave of the future.
Now when you venture into a new subdivision, you see stop signs and yield signs. Someone clearly received the message that it’s a better idea than no signs.
The bonus for local residents is this won’t cost us a dime, unless you’re one of those who has been nabbed by photo radar. The stop signs are going to be added at troublesome locations around the community. The city is going to be a little bit safer to travel in. We’re moving away from an archaic mode of traffic control.
Our budget won’t take a hit from installing signs at 40 intersections this year.
It’s a winning situation on all fronts.
Just don’t claim that you didn’t know what a stop sign means if you get involved in an accident after driving through one of those signs.
