385 replies to this topic

[tjv]

You're going from a starter being used 2-4x per day to 10-20x per day, and all the wear and tear that comes with the starting of an engine that many times. You're also putting more strain on the battery, the alternator, etc.

I believe auto start cars don't use the starter to re engage the motor, something like compressed air or something.  I remember being with my brother and he has one of those auto stop cars and that was my exact feelings, but it turned out it was different although I can't remember what it was.  I recently paid $2000 to replace the starter in my BMW 7 series

Edited by tjv, 12 July 2018 - 10:45 AM.

[Mike K.]

Maybe some fancy European models do, but not your typical Ford or Chrysler. They engineer them to crank that starter as and the rest of the shabang hoping it all breaks down just hours after your warranty expires.

 

There's a reason why 1990-2005 vintage pick-ups are in such high demand these days, and why their prices are soaring. You can literally purchase a 1995 Ford F350 for the same price as a 2010, and it'll outlive the 2010 by years.

[Citified.ca]

Traffic congestion has been cited as the single most important issue facing View Royal residents, according to a resident survey. It topped the list by a large margin.

[Nparker]

Oh the irony. Perhaps Highway 1A  shouldn't have been "traffic-calmed".

[Mike K.]

Looks like the residents want more roads to be local resident prioritized. This means more traffic calming efforts, but they’ll inadvertently lead to more congestion.

Mayor Screech should be the one championing for better transit and rail, but I suspect that the E&N has literally no support among his residents (for obvious reasons) and they also don’t want to be the secondary route for Westshore traffic. It’s a tough situation to be in but View Royal is literally in everyone’s way when officials there start playing with traffic calming.

[RFS]

View Royal shouldn't even exist

[Mike K.]

No, it shouldn’t. It should be split between Colwood, Highlands, Saanich and Esquimalt.

[Nparker]

Looks like the residents want more roads to be local resident prioritized. This means more traffic calming efforts, but they’ll inadvertently lead to more congestion...

Are VR residents really not able to understand this? 

[Victoria Watcher]

No, it shouldn’t. It should be split between Colwood, Highlands, Saanich and Esquimalt.

 

that would be quite logical looking at a map.  maybe victoria should cede vic west to esquimalt to show the way.  or at least saanich victoria and oak bay could fix the "panhandle".    

Edited by Victoria Watcher, 08 May 2019 - 03:03 AM.

[Mike K.]

Yup.

[jonny]

View Royal shouldn't even exist

 

Nor should Esquimalt, Oak Bay or Colwood, yet here we are. 

[Cassidy]

As somebody who lives in a location whereby the peripheral effects of the Colwood Crawl affect me every single time I drive home from work, I have complete sympathy with the folks who live in View Royal. 

 

Imagine for a second that you simply can't get to your house in less than an hour, or can't get to your kids to pick them up from school, or from daycare ... it's a nightmare. And View Royal residents (in many ways) pay the heaviest price as a transit zone from downtown to the Westshore.

 

IMO highway 1A should be shut down to traffic completely in whatever direction the Crawl is traveling, and for the period of time that the Crawl lasts. There's no way that 1A should be used as a supplementary Crawl route (the same goes for West Burnside) at the expense of the people who actually live in the neighborhood.

The route from the Westshore to downtown Victoria IS the Trans Canada Highway ... all other routes through residential areas should be shut down completely to through traffic during Crawl hours.

Edited by Cassidy, 08 May 2019 - 09:34 AM.

[Mike K.]

How about we shut down the roadways in any direction View Royal residents want to travel?

One can quickly see how a municipality reliant on other municipalities would lose what little battle it felt it could win by becoming a gatekeeper.

View Royal should be ensuring traffic moves through the community as expediently as possible and not trying to stifle the traffic flow that literally freezes the movement of its own residents.

Screech ought to fight to expand the TCH to three lanes in each direction rather than grumble about traffic snaking through the “town.”

The way View Royal obstructed the concept of a secondary casino built in the downtown core embodied a self-centred attitude that I suspect put off a lot of people.

[Cassidy]

I doubt you'll find a "prouder" group of residents than you will View Royal residents. They're quite entrenched in their identity as residents of View Royal.

 

But I disagree with you Mike ... in the same way I believe Burnside should be shut down to whichever direction the Crawl travels. It simply isn't appropriate or fair to residents who have nothing to do with the Westshore, and nothing to do with the Colwood Crawl, and who are obliged to absorb a non-stop, solid line of traffic on Burnside, or Hwy.1A ... such that they can't even drive their kids to the local school in the morning, or pick up those same kids from school at the end of the school day. Until you've lived it for years, all the way from Grade 1 though to Grade 7, maybe best to at least attempt to understand what it might be like for residents of these side roads that Colwood Crawl drivers to use to try and avoid Highway #1.

 

There's no more reason for View Royal to suck up the Colwood Crawl leftovers than there is for Oak Bay to.

 

I live this **** every day when I try to get home, stuck in an endless line of traffic ... and I don't live anywhere near the Westshore, I (and all my neighbors) just suffer from Saanich's willingness to let Crawl drivers use a bunch of Saanich residential streets for their commute ... as opposed to using Highway #1 where they belong.

For the years of trying to get my kid to school at Spectrum/St. Josephs, Marigold ... sometimes not able to get within a mile of the school before hitting a traffic jam ... I say folks who aren't affected probably aren't even entitled to an opinion on the subject of blocking off Burnside or #1A in the direction of the Crawl, and for the duration of the Crawl.

[Jackerbie]

^

[Mike K.]

I doubt you'll find a "prouder" group of residents than you will View Royal residents. They're quite entrenched in their identity as residents of View Royal.

But I disagree with you Mike ... in the same way I believe Burnside should be shut down to whichever direction the Crawl travels. It simply isn't appropriate or fair to residents who have nothing to do with the Westshore, and nothing to do with the Colwood Crawl, and who are obliged to absorb a non-stop, solid line of traffic on Burnside, or Hwy.1A ... such that they can't even drive their kids to the local school in the morning, or pick up those same kids from school at the end of the school day. Until you've lived it for years, all the way from Grade 1 though to Grade 7, maybe best to at least attempt to understand what it might be like for residents of these side roads that Colwood Crawl drivers to use to try and avoid Highway #1.

There's no more reason for View Royal to suck up the Colwood Crawl leftovers than there is for Oak Bay to.

I live this **** every day when I try to get home, stuck in an endless line of traffic ... and I don't live anywhere near the Westshore, I (and all my neighbors) just suffer from Saanich's willingness to let Crawl drivers use a bunch of Saanich residential streets for their commute ... as opposed to using Highway #1 where they belong.
For the years of trying to get my kid to school at Spectrum/St. Josephs, Marigold ... sometimes not able to get within a mile of the school before hitting a traffic jam ... I say folks who aren't affected probably aren't even entitled to an opinion on the subject of blocking off Burnside or #1A in the direction of the Crawl, and for the duration of the Crawl.

View Royal residents are fully aware of the situation when deciding that that’s where they would like to reside, and real-estate valuations are reflective of the situation.

What happens when someone decides to live somewhere is their whims and fancies suddenly become paramount desires, and the needs of anyone else become irrelevant. View Royal wants access to the core, they want access to the Westshore, and they want it unhindered. But that’s not possible when the location of the community is in the middle of two centres with inadequate infrastructure between them.

View Royal residents are also unhappy about the prospect of the E&N being resurrected, btw.

[Cassidy]

Many View Royal homeowners are long time residents who were in place long before there ever was a Colwood Crawl.

I'm not sure such folks "deserve" anything negative, rather they just want to enjoy their street/neighborhood/municipality the same as anybody in Oak Bay or Saanich might enjoy theirs. Being able to drive you kids to or from school, or an aging parent to the a doctors appointment without a one hour wait in the midst of the Colwood Crawl seems not too much to ask for.

 

As I noted in my earlier post, Highway #1 is the route from the Westshore to the COV downtown core ... there's no need whatsoever to duplicate the Colwood Crawl on Highway #1A so folks can save 5 minutes in their commute.

Nobody is being denied access from the Westshore to downtown with the closing of #1A (or Burnside) to Crawl traffic ... get on Highway #1 where you belong.

They're spending tens of millions on Highway #1 just for the Crawl folks ... clearely indiating that #1A isn't considered part of the commute path to or from the Westshore to or from the COV downtown core.

 

As for the E&N note, I've heard this sentiment anecdotally, but seen no actual verified documentation which would support it. Perhaps even more relevant though is that the E&N will never be resurrected anyway, so the point is ultimately quite moot (except to falsely disparage View Royal residents as Luddites and uncooperative municipal neighbors).

 

 

[Mike K.]

The Old Island Highway was once the Island Highway, so traffic issues have been a problem for residents of that community for generations.

And throughout nearly the entire history of the area they also had freight, logging and passenger trains snaking down the entire municipality, and why land was once upon a time super cheap out there.

[lanforod]

I could have saved 100k buying a very nice house in View Royal when I was looking. Instead I paid more for a older, not as nice house in Royal Oak and I thank my intuition and research that I did that every time I get stuck in traffic between the Core and West shore, almost always on McKenzie or in the View Royal area.

 

Many people who live there moved there when the traffic was already an issue. As Mike pointed out, before the crawl on Highway 1, there was traffic issues already then.

 

That all said, work is being done right now to help alleviate the issues with the crawl, which should have a positive effect on the roads around there; the interchange is the big one. Improving bus transit times is another. Much more needs to be done though; I think HOV lanes on HWY 1 would help too.

[Cassidy]

The Old Island Highway was once the Island Highway.....

And throughout nearly the entire history of the area they also had freight, logging and passenger trains snaking down the entire municipality, and why land was once upon a time super cheap out there.

But the Old Island Highway is the Island Highway no longer, which is kind of the point.

It's essentially a residential access road in 2019 ... but one that's being abused by folks living on the Westshore who believe than can save 5 or 10 minutes on their commute by driving through residential neighborhoods rather than sticking to the #1. (same sentiment holds true for residents of Burnside, who in many ways has it even worse, and who have absolutely nothing to do with the Westshore).

 

They did have trains running through back in the day (as they ran all over Victoria and surrounds) but I'm not sure what that has to do with the Colwood Crawl unnecessarily spilling onto the 1A in 2019?