Cathedral neighbourhood residents voicing support for lower speed limit

Residents of Regina’s Cathedral neighbourhood are voicing support for a lower speed limit.

City council is scheduled to vote next week on whether to make the neighbourhood a 30 kilometre per hour (km/h) safety zone. If approved, other neighbourhoods may request the same.

Elle Grzeda has seen a lot of close calls outside her restaurant on 13th Avenue. She supports a lower speed limit.

“Especially on 13th Avenue with all of the storefront businesses and children constantly running around in these streets, I think that definitely on 13th it should be lowered, not to mention there were two deaths on this street,” she said.

Those pedestrian deaths occurred last year. It has prompted serious discussion about reducing the speed limit to 30 km/h in Cathedral.

“I think this needs to happen. I think it’s going to be interesting to see how it all rolls out,” Trish Elliott, a Cathedral neighbourhood resident, said.

Earlier this week, the reduced speed limit proposal was reviewed at an open house hosted by the city.

“[A] 30 zone in that area would make a lot of sense just to protect the children and the pedestrians. That’s a priority,” Cheryl Grzeda, a Cathedral neighbourhood resident, said.

The neighbourhood school trustee said speed is a special concern around schools.

“The Cathedral Neighbourhood though is a little different in that it brings more people from outside in and there just seems to be a lot more traffic,” Sarah Cummings Truszkowski said.

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The city’s executive committee recently approved creation of a Cathedral community safety zone. The reduced speed limit will be brought forward next week for city council approval.

“I think people are interested in making the community safer. I think there is a consensus about that. Some people are opposed to 30 across the community. Some people are very supportive of slowing the speed down on 13th,” Ward 3 coun. Andrew Stevens said.

If approved, it could spark similar calls from other neighbourhoods.

“It’s one of the biggest concerns that I hear over and over again is people opposed to speeding. They just want people to slow down so that we have safer streets,” Ward 1 coun. Cheryl Stadnichuk said.

Reduced residential speed limits have been implemented in Calgary and Montreal, and Winnipeg has a pilot project. The feedback has generally been positive and accident severity reduced in many cases.