The Township of Langley has been polling residents about a proposal to send more traffic down busy 16 Avenue.
The King Road connector is an Abbotsford plan that would connect Highway 1 to 16 Avenue.
It would link King Road, at Bradner Road, with Mt. Lehman Road at Marshall Road.
The Abbotsford municipal website says the road link “will provide an important transportation connection between Abbotsford and Langley/Surrey through the 16th Avenue corridor and will reduce traffic volume on Fraser Highway and 8th Avenue.”
Abbotsford held a public consultation meeting about the King Road connector of local residents in that city on Tuesday, April 14.
A report is due in September.
Langley Township posted an online poll about King Road and other proposed changes to 16 Avenue on the municipal website in July. It asked residents to rate their concerns about safety and traffic congestion issues along 16 avenue.
The Township also wanted respondents to review proposed short, medium and long-term options for the designated truck route.
Short-term plans, defined as the next five years, could include pull-outs along the mostly two-lane road to allow drivers to get around slower-moving vehicles and permit police to pull people over.
Medium-term, defined as a 10-year-period that follows, would see 16 Avenue become a four-lane route west of 176 Street with a median barrier. There would be more left-turn lanes and five intersections in Langley, and Abbotsford would get traffic lights: 208, 232, 272, Lefeuvre and Bradner.
The medium-term plan includes construction of the “King Road Connector” by Abbotsford.
Long-term plans, 15 years or more from now, would add still more left-turn lanes and widen the road to four lanes east of 176. The intersections at 224 and 240 would get traffic lights.
The proposals are listed in a recently-completed study of 16 Avenue by Surrey, Langley Township and Abbotsford, along with the Ministry of Transportation and Infrastructure, ICBC and TransLink.
The study notes that the 16 Avenue corridor “has a history of safety and traffic operation issues” and “speeding is reportedly a problem.”
It also notes the route is currently running 13 to 16 per cent truck traffic, compared to the “average arterial” which carries five to 10 per cent trucks.
Langley Township would pay more than the other two municipalities combined if all the proposed changes were made — $133.5 million compared to $72.5 million for Surrey and $20.5 million for Abbotsford.
The Greater Langley and Abbotsford Chambers of Commerce have both called for improvements to 16 Avenue, in a joint statement that said the “inefficiency of the current transportation network causes a major barrier to business and investment” and calls on the province to designate 16 Avenue a provincial highway.
“This connector would relieve the bottle neck of traffic between Langley and Abbotsford (and) facilitate increased efficiency in the movement of people, goods and services” the chambers’ statement said.