{"id":687738,"date":"2026-05-23T03:31:13","date_gmt":"2026-05-23T03:31:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/687738\/"},"modified":"2026-05-23T03:31:13","modified_gmt":"2026-05-23T03:31:13","slug":"winnipeg-seeks-fixes-for-congested-and-extremely-unreliable-stretch-of-st-marys-road","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/687738\/","title":{"rendered":"Winnipeg seeks fixes for ‘congested and extremely unreliable’ stretch of St. Mary’s Road"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Text<\/p>\n

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Estimated 4 minutes<\/p>\n

The audio version of this article is generated by AI-based technology. Mispronunciations can occur. We are working with our partners to continually review and improve the results.<\/p>\n

The City of Winnipeg is looking for solutions to improve a roughly 1.5-kilometre stretch of St. Mary’s Road, a busy commuter route the area’s city councillor says has become a bottleneck slowing traffic and been the site of a number of crashes in recent years.<\/p>\n

“That stretch is congested and extremely unreliable,” St. Vital Coun. Brian Mayes told Information Radio guest host Cory Funk on Friday.\u00a0“I think it’s time to do something.”<\/p>\n

The process is beginning with a request for proposal<\/a> seeking a study on potential traffic flow and road safety improvements on St. Mary’s between St. Anne’s Road and Tache Avenue.<\/p>\n

“The average daily traffic on this segment is 40,400, which is very high for a four-lane undivided roadway, resulting in congestion and extreme travel time unreliability when even minor events occur,” that document says.<\/p>\n

The goal of the study is to find low-cost potential safety and traffic solutions that could be implemented in the short- to medium-term. But it won’t look at bigger changes, such as broadening the road or cycling infrastructure, which it says could fall under a future rapid transit study.<\/p>\n

Mayes said other options are on the table, including what he described as a “reverse lane” city staff are keen on, which would go northbound during the morning rush hour and southbound in the afternoon.<\/p>\n

“That would be amazing, if we could get that,” Mayes said. “Possibly widening a little bit to create a fifth lane, maybe down the middle, maybe for transit.”<\/p>\n

WATCH | City looking to study safety, traffic solutions on St. Mary’s Road:\"\"<\/p>\n

City looking to study safety, traffic solutions on St. Mary’s Road<\/p>\n

The City of Winnipeg is looking to improve safety and traffic along a busy commuter route that has seen a number of collisions in recent years. It’s commissioning a study to find potential low-cost solutions along a 1,500-metre section of St. Mary’s Road.<\/p>\n

Matt Allard, the councillor for the adjacent St. Boniface ward, said he thinks commuter issues on St. Mary’s are becoming more and more of an issue as the city grows \u2014 and he’s “intrigued” by the reverse lane idea.<\/p>\n

“I know that it’s been used in other municipalities, and I’m interested,” Allard told CBC’s Up to Speed guest host Chloe Friesen on Friday.\u00a0<\/p>\n

“On the surface, if lanes are busy, like in the morning, and they’re less busy in the afternoon and vice versa, then maybe there’s an opportunity there.”<\/p>\n

The request for proposal document says the city has made up to $390,000 available for the contract, excluding allowances that might be added to the contract upon award.<\/p>\n

‘A very dangerous street’<\/p>\n

Kendall Thiessen, co-owner of Woodcock Cycle Works, located at one end of the road’s bottleneck, said traffic flow issues result in a lot of vehicles merging right in front of his shop, especially in the mornings as people are trying to get downtown.<\/p>\n

“It can be dangerous, and we do get people in here who have been hit by cars,” he said.<\/p>\n

Crashes along that stretch of St. Mary’s have included a fatal crash in 2022<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Colin R\u00e9millard, whose family business, St-L\u00e9on Gardens, is also on St. Mary’s, said he hopes the city considers how any changes might affect businesses such as his. He said he’d support a flexible lane in the area.<\/p>\n

“Anything they could do to tweak things, you know, to increase the flow and also reduce, maybe, the dangers,” R\u00e9millard said.<\/p>\n

\"AKendall Thiessen, co-owner of Woodcock Cycle Works, says the stretch of road can be dangerous. (Jeff Stapleton\/CBC)<\/p>\n

“We know St. Mary’s is a fast street. It’s a very dangerous street. There’s pedestrians walking two feet away from cars going 60 kilometres an hour.”<\/p>\n

Allard said he’s “optimistic” whatever consultant selected will be able to find ways to improve traffic and safety without widening the road, while Mayes said he hopes to see the longstanding issue addressed in some way soon.<\/p>\n

“This isn’t a big widening \u2014 we don’t have the money to do it. But it’s \u2014 given all the density we’ve approved along St. Mary’s Road and the areas further south, Sage Creek, Bonavista … it just seems, you know, we’ve got a huge traffic volume there and extreme unreliability, as the study says,” Mayes said.<\/p>\n

“It’s something people have asked about for a long time. And I don’t know if I’m running again [in the upcoming civic election], but I would hate to leave feeling I’d done nothing on it.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Listen to this article Estimated 4 minutes The audio version of this article is generated by AI-based technology.…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":687739,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[194296],"tags":[49,48,22073],"class_list":["post-687738","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-winnipeg","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-winnipeg"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/687738","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=687738"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/687738\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/687739"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=687738"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=687738"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=687738"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}