Traffic Chaos at the Beach

Sally Angle | Jul 13, 2022

We at the Central Frontenac Railway Heritage Society were very surprised to hear that Central Frontenac Council voted on June 28, without community consultation, to turn Mathew Street in the village of Sharbot Lake into a one-way street. Under this new plan presented by the Public Works Department, traffic would travel only down the hill from Elizabeth Street to the beach.

Traffic would arrive at the intersection at the bottom of Mathew St. from all four directions, and would all be forced to turn and exit on Medical Centre Road south. In fact it's not clear how the northbound cars and trucks on Medical Centre Road would get turned around to head back south, other than by hoping there was a free parking space to turn around in. This traffic would all end up on the roadway which also carries the K&P Trail, and across which pedestrians are walking between the beach and the parking spaces across the road.

The Railway Heritage Society is very concerned about the potential for traffic congestion, even gridlock, on Medical Centre Road, when everybody has to turn around and leave the beach past the Medical Centre.  This is the historic original “main street” of the village. where the K&P tracks ran, and our village’s most important recreational and tourist attraction.

To create traffic chaos at the beach, right on top of the K&P Trail, is not a good tradeoff in order to eliminate the awkward uphill intersection at the top of Mathew Street.  In fact, we think that in order to avoid widening Mathew Street, it should be made one-way uphill.  This would reduce traffic congestion at the beach, and would allow two lanes at the top for right and left turns.

We hope that Council will reconsider its hasty decision, and allow some time for community input on a matter much more significant than it appears at first glance.

Sally Angle - Member

Board of Directors, CFRHS