Regina motorists face long wait times in traffic with construction occurring downtown on Saskatchewan Drive and 11th Avenue. This disruption has created ‘bottleneck situations’ for those wanting in and out of the Cornwall parkade.
A local resident who lives in the downtown area said it’s not fun maneuvering through construction.
“It’s tough getting around,” said Bill Gilbert. “But it’s improved over the last week or so. Hopefully it stays this way, and it doesn’t get any worse than that.”
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SaskPower spokesperson Scott McGregor said the commotion is part of the Regina downtown construction project. When construction began on Saskatchewan Drive, McGregor said, the company became aware of some motorist concerns about the traffic flows and leaving Cornwall parkade.
“As a result, we took our traffic control plan and we revised it and we took it back to the city, for review and approval,” he said. “That new plan was implemented on May 18th and since implementing that, flows have increased significantly.”
McGregor said one of the measures they have used as an interim between their revision of the traffic control plan is deploying flag persons at the parkade to stop traffic from travelling along Saskatchewan Drive which will allow motorists to leave the parkade.
“They’re currently working from 7 a.m. to 7 p.m. and it’s certainly helping with the flows of traffic,” he said. “We’ve heard the wait times to get out of the parkade are significantly reduced.”
Construction in the downtown area will continue until the fall before it picks up again next spring.