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Summer awareness campaign planned for 16 Avenue

Signs will remind drivers they are travelling along a ‘high crash’ corridor
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Township council has endorsed a motion by Coun. Angie Quaale to embark upon an awareness campaign for 16 Avenue, which would see signs installed along the road, reminding drivers it is a high-crash corridor.

Commuters along one of Langley’s deadliest roads will soon have a visual reminder to slow down, as the Township prepares a summer marketing campaign for the 16 Avenue corridor.

Spearheaded by Coun. Angie Quaale, who presented a motion to create the campaign at the April 25 afternoon council meeting, the strategy will remind people that the corridor is a “high crash” area.

Between 2008 and 2012, there were 673 crashes on 16 Avenue, and most recently, a Langley grandmother was killed while trying to drive across the road.

Council has already voted to study whether signal lights at each major intersection along 16 Avenue are warranted, but in the interim, Quaale says immediate action should be taken. In her motion, she suggests the PR campaign could include improved signage along 16 Avenue and its abutting roads, specifically indicating the 60 km/h speed limit and identifying cross streets.

“The priorities were for me, as we heard in the last meeting, the identification of the cross streets with school buses … and the importance of the corridor to farm vehicles,” Quaale told council.

Coun. Charlie Fox, who lives in south Langley and frequently crosses 16 Avenue, said he’s already seen an increase police presence on the road.

RCMP recently caught one driver speeding down the corridor at 180 km/h, and two motorcyclists travelling at 118 km/h.

“I have to suggest that the best marketing campaign that could ever happen is happening right now on 16  Avenue. There’s not a day that I go down 16 Avenue that there’s not a radar truck,” Fox said.

“It has made a substantial difference. The best marketing campaign is a little car with red and blue lights that sits there and has no markings on it whatsoever.”