Ville-Marie Tunnel concerns

MONTREAL – Questions are being raised about the safety of a just-opened Ville Marie Expressway exit ramp that is unusually steep and curvy.

The St. Jacques St. exit of the westbound Ville Marie reopened in August after it was rebuilt to make way for a vehicle entrance to the adjacent McGill University Health Centre superhospital now under construction.

The needlessly complicated design increases the risk of accidents, and the ramp’s safety signage is inadequate, road-safety expert Luis Amador, a Concordia University civil engineering assistant professor, told The Gazette.

The one-lane ramp was built by Louisbourg SBC using a design by a consortium made up of SNC-Lavalin and CIMA+, according to public-tender documents. The project cost $10.9 million, including an MUHC access road and related work.

The St. Jacques exit is used by 8,500 vehicles daily, according to 2011 figures.

Amador’s analysis of the new ramp is based on photos and a video provided to him by The Gazette.

“I don’t like the design,” Amador said, adding he has never seen an exit ramp like this one in Quebec or elsewhere in the world.

It features a sharp “reverse curve” or “S-curve,” compelling drivers leaving the Ville Marie to first steer right, then left, then right again.

Amador said it does not fulfill a key road-safety requirement: “You need to provide the driver with enough clues to know exactly what to expect and what to do.”

Drivers coming off a highway “aren’t expecting a reverse curve. And the traffic signs are not good: You’re missing chevrons – yellow-and-black arrows – telling you where to turn.”

The ramp features small rectangular orange-and-silver signs on some concrete barriers along its edges, but there are no signs at the sharpest curve. Amador said a series of light-reflecting chevron signs should be posted at all curves.

Without those chevrons, drivers will “likely hit the (concrete) barriers along the ramp,” especially at night or in reduced visibility caused by fog, rain or snow. “The curves are very sharp – the first one especially.”

Amador said Transport Quebec should “send someone to post chevron signs right away on both curves to tell drivers: ‘Hey, you have to steer right,’ and ‘Hey, you have to steer left.’ That is a must. That is a minimum.”

But he said the ramp also poses other problems. For example, the drivers’ line of sight is blocked, meaning motorists might not have enough time to brake if something unexpected happens ahead.

“Imagine something drops from a vehicle,” Amador said. “When you’re driving behind it, you won’t be able to see the obstacle up ahead.

“Next thing you know, the obstacle is in front of you. You try to do a manoeuvre (to avoid it) but it’s a one-lane so you can’t. You apply the brakes. The guy behind you doesn’t know what’s going on. He might crash into you.”

The Ville Marie’s speed limit is 70 kilometres per hour. It’s 45 km/h on the ramp.

Because of its orange colour, the ramp’s speed-limit sign will be difficult for the elderly to see at night, Amador said. The sign should be yellow, he said. If drivers aren’t alerted to the speed reduction, the sharp curves are even more dangerous.

Amador said he could not comment on how difficult it will be for large vehicles to manoeuvre the curves. The ramp is used by Société de transport de Montréal buses.

Amador said the ramp’s slope seems excessively steep in the photos and video, but that he could not tell whether this could pose problems for drivers when roads are wet or snowy.

Caroline Larose, a spokesperson for Transport Quebec, said her department chose the curvy design as a traffic-calming measure. She said the city of Montreal asked Transport Quebec to put measures in place to reduce the speed of drivers before they reach St. Jacques St.

“The objective is to reduce the speed of drivers who are going from a highway to a municipal road, but (the design) also respects safety standards,” she said. She did not know whether Transport Quebec plans to start using the design on other exits.

The ramp’s steep slope will be reduced once the Ville Marie is rebuilt, Larose said. The Ville Marie is to be lowered in several years as part of the reconstruction of the Turcot Interchange.

Though the barriers along the ramp look temporary, Larose said the ramp will stay as is until the Ville Marie is lowered.

Larose said Transport Quebec has no reports of accidents on the newly designed ramp, which reopened on Aug. 31 after being closed for almost seven months.

The MUHC was not involved in the ramp’s design, said a spokeswoman, Julie Paquet. The ramp goes over an entrance to the hospital for employees, delivery vehicles and ambulances, Paquet said.

The St. Jacques exit reconstruction is part of $90 million in road changes around the superhospital that are being funded equally by the city of Montreal, Transport Quebec and the MUHC.

Amador said he does not understand why Transport Quebec would not have just used a single gradual curve, similar to the one the old ramp had.

Normally, exit ramps have a single curve or are built as loops, where motorists drive continuously in a single direction to reach the next road, Amador said.

“Using (a reverse curve) just because you want people to drop speed doesn’t make any sense,” he said. “There is no need in my view for using a reverse curve when you can use a simple curve.”

Amador said reverse curves are normally only used “when we need to change the alignment of a road, because there is an obstacle and there is no other remedy.”