Ever notice how people hate to have to stop their vehicle for any reason, or even slow down, when they're driving?
Perhaps that's why every so often someone once again floats the idea of constructing a highway bypass around Duncan.
This time the discussion cropped up at a recent North Cowichan council meeting. They were looking at their master transportation plan and opted to remove options for a highway bypass from it.
There's no doubt that on a Friday afternoon, especially in the summer or around holidays, traffic gets backed up at the stoplights along the TCH corridor through Duncan. The rest of the time, it's really not that bad. Ask anyone who's recently come from a larger city and they'll tell you it's a minor inconvenience at most (provided, of course, that there are no collisions requiring land closures, but that's not just a Duncan problem). Sure, you'll likely have to wait out a few stop lights. But consider that you have to do that on the highway bypasses through Ladysmith and Nanaimo, so what's the difference? And let's not forget that the current TCH route through Duncan is the bypass that was built in 1958.
A new bypass for the bypass would, conservatively, cost hundreds of millions. We think it more likely it would costs billions given what we're paying for infrastructure construction these days. And might end up taking more time to drive on the potentially lengthy bypass than if you just had some patience and used the existing corridor. That's to say nothing of the problems of acquiring the land necessary to construct such a thing. People are living in these areas, have farms in these areas, and a significant portion of the land belongs to Cowichan Tribes.
Then you have to consider the wisdom of routing people far away from all of the businesses that can benefit from the traffic. Do we really want to make it less likely that people will stop in Duncan and North Cowichan as they travel from points north and south? There are certainly benefits to being a natural stop on the way from Victoria or Nanaimo.
We would far rather see any billions that become available for transportation infrastructure funnelled into resurrecting the rain line, which could alleviate some of the traffic woes on the highway in a forward-thinking and sustainable way.
There's a reason officials passed on the idea in 2005 and 2014. But it will come up again in the future. Let's try to think beyond the car when it does.