By Sarah Stone

Bus stop arms research crossing borders

Apr 30, 2013 | 6:34 AM

Prince Albert city council set a deadline of six weeks to have committees formed and research gathered on the use of bus stop arms in city limits—but that deadline has come and gone with nothing being presented at council.

However, leaders of the petition to get the arms installed back on the Prince Albert school buses, Cynthia Mamer and Lorrie Stevenson, are not worried.

They met with Colin Innes director of public works last Wednesday and said he’s been working diligently to gather as much information as possible.

“Cynthia and I thought it was just fantastic. He’s met with different people, he’s really taken the initiative and done what he said he was going to do and more,” Stevenson said.

“We’d hoped more would be done by now, like committees would have met, but I still think he sounds like he’s going to try his hardest to get everything that he needs done before the beginning of the school year.”

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Innes said he’s currently reviewing the research he’s collected until the committee set to discuss all sides of the issue forms.

“I’ve found a bunch of good information and really where I’m at is trying to assemble that—as well the committee I’m referred to hasn’t been struck yet. It’s the joint school boards and city committee that was going to look at discussing that [and] there’s not meeting date that’s been set for that,” Innes said.

He said he believes a possible reason the committee hasn’t had a chance to come together could relate to the recent committee reviews taking place at city hall, which may delay forming this group until a proper structure is decided.

Until that time, he’ll just continue to research with no exact deadline in mind.

“If I feel I’ve reached my conclusion before a committee is struck I’ll just prepare a report, so it’s ready for when the committee meets and if the committee is available before then, than I can take my points that I have into the committee meeting and we can have dialogue in there,” he explained.

In his findings, Innes has looked at many factors for and against the use of bus stop arms and still hasn’t made a personal opinion on which would be most effective in Prince Albert.

“What I’ve been looking at is seeing what kind of experiences that other municipalities, not just within Saskatchewan but with Canada and the United States, their experiences with these devices,” he said, adding there is a trend that shows larger centres usually don’t utilize the device, while in smaller centres they do.

“I haven’t really reached a full conclusion yet. I’ve read a lot of interesting information about bus safety in general and pedestrian safety, traffic control devices and the effectiveness on it,” he said. “There’s actually a whole lot of different factors that go into what makes for a safe crossing and potentially things that can happen.”

“I’m certainly finding a lot of really good information to consider.”

sstone@panow.com

On Twitter: @sarahstone84