Residents of Ashdale Crescent, off of Booth, gather to sign a petition asking city council not to send city transit buses down their residential street. L to R Denise Turcotte, Neil Russell, Natasha Laframboise, Jake Turcotte and Ron Mousseau. Photos by Jeff Turl.
She says the residents of Ashdale Crescent and Bunting Drive will be circulating a petition today to stop the transit changes that would see the buses turn around on Ashdale and Bunting.
"If this was the proposed solution to the concerns of the the residents of Labreche, then those living on Ashdale and Bunting should have been notified so that our voice could have been heard at the City meeting (last night). Giving the residents three days notice is unacceptable."
Ashdale has many issues like those of Labreche.
Laframboise says her street has no sidewalks, young children playing, many vehicles and parking issues.
"It's a densely populated area, as every home on Ashdale is a semi and many have legal apartments. There is cooperative housing on Bunting which increased traffic. Vehicles and school buses already have a difficult time navigating the street," added Laframboise.
Neil Russell and Natasha Laframboise own homes on Ashdale. They are concerned about the safety of children on the street if city buses are allowed to drive through.
Her neighbour, Neil Russell agrees saying one of the biggest issues is the amount of vehicles already on the 30ft wide street.
"Nearly every one of the houses here has an apartment. Every driveway consists of anywhere from four to six and sometimes seven vehicles. With that amount of vehicles it makes it difficult to pull out and with the amount of children around, we're looking to make it as safe as possible."
Russell says the street if often used by children to play.
"By having shared driveways and lawns, it doesn't allow much room for the children to be able to play. so what we end up doing is taking to the streets for hockey, catch, baseball, basketball---whatever the case may be."
Lafromboise has created a Facebook page, and says she has been given 10 minutes to talk to council at its next meeting Monday.
See the Facebook page here:https://www.facebook.com/groups/1627933994087348/
"As residents of Ashdale or Bunting please join us in fighting to keep the city bus off our streets!", says the page.
She says the buses can easily go 3km down Booth Road to Ferris Drive to turn around safely with no impact to any residential area.
The new routes are scheduled to go into effect Sunday.
See original story: News bus route hits opposition http://www.baytoday.ca/content/news/details.asp?c=78780
