Edmonton trying to keep Henday exit at 127 Street open after province announces closure

Edmonton City Council is trying to convince the province to keep the 127 Street exit at the southern leg of Anthony Henday Drive open.

The city is proposing that it take over operation and maintenance of the exit from the province for the rest of the decade, according to 630 CHED. The justification is that the road and 135 Street will be needed to access a future park-and-ride lot when the lease at Century Park LRT Station runs out.

“If the park-and-ride is going to open in 2020, this road’s got to be ready in the fall of ’19,” Bryan Anderson, who is the councillor for the area, said.

He made an emergency motion last week to approach the province before the Nov. 12 deadline.

READ MORE: Anthony Henday Drive exit at 127 Street to be permanently closed 

Last week, the province said access to and from southwest Anthony Henday Drive at 127 Street in southwest Edmonton would be permanently closed as of Nov. 12 at 10 p.m.

“The current configuration in and out, onto the southwest Edmonton ring road wasn’t really safe,” Transportation Minister Brian Mason said Nov. 1.

Tweet This Click to share quote on Twitter: "The current configuration in and out, onto the southwest Edmonton ring road wasn't really safe," Transportation Minister Brian Mason said Nov. 1.

The interchange was built more than a decade ago, when that particular section of the Henday had intersections with signals, which slowed down traffic.

“These intersections have been upgraded to interchanges and various road improvement projects in the area are complete, so it is time to close the intersection to ensure the safe flow of high-speed traffic on the highway,” the province said in a release.

READ MORE: ‘It certainly is loud’: Province moves up noise study on SW Anthony Henday Drive 

Edmonton Mayor Don Iveson said closing the access point will make the “major capacity challenges” in the southwest even worse.

“If we can delay it and look at some alternatives and try to at least give people in those neighbourhoods a sense of what’s coming to make things better, because it is very congested there,” Iveson told 630 CHED.

According to 630 CHED’s Scott Johnson, Anderson said the collision statistics the province was quoting were actually six times worse than the reality.

“Their figure of 30 to 40 is right. It’s just not annual,” Anderson said. “It’s an over-emphasis using safety issues to conceivably close a road that they didn’t necessarily want to upgrade or maintain.”

With files from Scott Johnson, 630 CHED