New street could create business opportunity while easing Liberty Village traffic woes

By Dennis Hanagan –

Looking north on Strachan Avenue from the railway bridge. City planners say the best plan is to connect the new street directly to Strachan Avenue at the bottom of this railway bridge. A contrary opinion says that plan won’t work because there’s too littl

A new east-west road planned for the extreme south end of Liberty Village between Dufferin St. and Strachan Ave. will provide much-needed traffic relief within the village, but it’s giving villagers and city planners a headache as to what to do with it at Strachan.

City planners prefer a direct connection to Strachan but admit critical infrastructure belonging to Metrolinx/GO Transit stands in the way. “Further study will be undertaken to determine if any of the obstacles can be moved,” says a city flyer inviting public comment.

Liberty Village Residents Association president Todd Hofley thinks a direct connection is wishful thinking. “I doubt this new road will ever connect to Strachan. There is very little room to actually put an entrance there, right before the (railway) bridge.”

A direct connection is “appealing,” says the village BIA’s executive director Lynn Clay. But like Hofley, the BIA board thinks it’s unlikely, and the new road will probably connect to side street Solidarity Way (just west of Strachan) which connects to East Liberty St.

Village resident Bob Howley told The Bulletin at a Dec. 1 public meeting he favours a direct connection. If it connects to Solidarity Way and then to East Liberty traffic is going to “bottleneck,” he says.

Artist’s rendering of the proposed new east-west street for the south side of Liberty Village.

Adding to the confusion is a plan to eliminate the level railway crossing at Strachan, which will be diverted slightly to the west while construction crews spend more than a year routing the tracks under Strachan.

(Village residents call for traffic lights at East Liberty and Strachan, and Hofley agrees. But, he adds “they can’t install traffic lights now because of the work that’s going on with Metrolinx. Everybody knows we absolutely need traffic lights there. It’s a terrible intersection.”)

As for the new road’s general appearance it’s expected to have one narrow driving lane in each direction, no on-street parking, a sidewalk, a bicycle path, trees, and benches. Even sculptures have been suggested.

Clay says it’s estimated the new road will draw 30 to 40 per cent of vehicles off Liberty St. “That will greatly improve the flow of traffic along Liberty,” she says.

And by connecting it to currently dead end side streets in the village’s west end it’ll open up an array of business opportunities on those side roads. “We expect main floor retail and restaurants with office units above,” says Clay.

Those connections will also mean better access for emergency vehicles in the village’s south section, she points out. There’ll also be stop signs at the intersections to slow traffic, and the “village feel” will be maintained, says Clay.

Hofley also foresees side street business opportunities. “It would be interesting to see what sort of retail would spring up on these side streets,” he says.

With another 5,000 to 6,000 residents expected to move into the village “they’re all going to need places to shop, places to eat. These are completely untapped streets with some really great heritage buildings.”

What will future village traffic be like? Hofley has opposing views on that. In two years 75 per cent of development will be complete “so we’ll have a lot less truck traffic,” he says.

On the other hand, Liberty Village is becoming a popular destination so “traffic is also going to get worse.”

City planners are taking public comments on the proposed road up to Jan. 6 and will compile an environmental report by spring 2012.