Union Street East reconstruction

Thank you for your question. Please see our latest update on this project in the News feed.

City staff and Council are still working out some details before identifying the preferred conceptual design alternative.  We hope to be able to do this in April and will update the Engage Waterloo page to reflect this.

Regarding intersection design, full reconstruction of the King Street South and Moore Avenue South intersections are not part of the scope of this project.  The intersections from Mary to Lucan will be designed in accordance with Ontario Traffic Manual Book 18: Cycling Facilities.  Book 18 was recently updated by a project team that included the authors of the City of Ottawa Protected Intersection Design Guide, and includes guidance on protected intersections.  Some design guidance from Book 18 on improving safety at intersection can be implemented, however space constraints will prevent implementation of most measures at most of the intersections.  City staff regularly work with the authors of the City of Ottawa’s design guide.  They also prepared the City’s recently completed Transportation Master Plan.  City staff reviewed the design context for Union Street with the lead author of the City of Ottawa’s design guide who concurred that most of what is presented in the design guide couldn’t be implemented in our context.  

Based on community and council feedback, City staff have prepared a concept to extend cycling infrastructure from Mary to King. This concept was presented to council at the May 31^st council meeting and can be viewed in the packet for the May 31^st council meeting on our website. The conceptual design still needs further development and may change following a safety review and as we move through into the detailed design and property acquisition process.

The implementation of any new design on Union Street between Moore and Margaret would likely be done concurrently with the full reconstruction of that section of road or possibly in conjunction with the resurfacing of the road.  Currently there are no plans to fully reconstruct Union Street from Moore Avenue to Margaret Avenue within the next 10-years.  That section of Union may be up for resurfacing within the next 10 years, at which time changes to the design of the road may be considered.  Engineering design standards are always being revised and updated and different designs can be recommended for different sections of road based on available space, traffic volume, speeds and surrounding land use.  The future design of cycling infrastructure on Union Street between Moore and Margaret will be assessed to the most up to date standards at that time and the most appropriate design will be selected for that section of road.

Burying overhead hydro and utilities is extremely costly. As such, the Council-approved budget for the project does not include funds for burying of overhead utilities, only relocation where required for the implementation of the preferred design alternative. For context, the City had given consideration to burying the overhead hydro on Albert Street when new cycling infrastructure was implemented between Bridgeport Road and Erb Street, but decided against it as it would have nearly doubled the cost of the project.

A new pedestrian refuge island at Herbert was preferred as it provides better connectivity with adjacent side streets and allows for the existing left-turn lane to be maintained. Installation of new islands at both streets would be unwarranted as there is just over 100 metres between the two locations.

New traffic signals are the responsibility of the Region of Waterloo and are not being considered as part of this project.

Speeds around school zones on surrounding streets are outside the scope of this project, but we will forward your feedback to our Transportation team.

Union Street Design Alternative 2 includes a pedestrian refuge island at Herbert Street. 

Coordination with third-party utilities takes place during the preliminary and detailed design phases of all road reconstruction projects; however, improvements such as installing new optical fiber are completed at the sole discretion of the utility agencies. As of November 2019, Bell had indicated that they do not have plans for improvements within the project limits.

While the centreline may shift slightly in some locations during detailed design, it is unlikely that the alignment of the road will significantly change from these design alternatives to the final design.