The city collected feedback from Rossdale residents Tuesday evening on its renewal plans for their neighbourhood. The draft design largely consists of replacing or upgrading roads and sidewalks, including widening sidewalks where possible, adjusting road widths to meet city standards, adding walking and biking connections, improving street lighting, and increasing traffic calming. The city is also proposing closing off Rossdale Road at 102 Street and 98 Avenue, and extending the existing shared pathway at the intersection, which it says would improve overall mobility and support the city’s safe mobility strategy. “I don’t agree with (that) because that’s one of the only ways we can access our community,” resident Brent Elton told CTV News Edmonton after the public engagement session at ArtsHub Ortona. “We’d have to access it off of 97 (Avenue) across three lanes (of traffic)... turning left, up 102 Street. It’d create a problem.” He continued, “Overall, I think it’s a good idea. There’s a few concerns we have in how they’ve got the traffic flow. I’m hoping that this time, when we talk to the city, that they’ll listen.” Becky Redford, supervisor of the neighbourhoods planning and design department, acknowledged the concern amongst the mixed reviews. “Some people are really excited about what they’re seeing.… And of course we’re hearing the opposite. Change is a challenge,” she said. “We’re here to listen, understand what the impacts are to residents, and find a way to work around that.” Feedback can be submitted to the project website until May 3. Redford said the city would incorporate it into a final design to be presented to the public again in the future. There is not a timeline yet for construction. Rossdale is classified as a priority growth area, or one of the areas of the city that is expected to grow fastest as Edmonton expands to 1.25 million people. With files from CTV News Edmonton’s Galen McDougall
