'Have to do something' about Brandon intersection after fatal crash, chamber president says

The president of Brandon's Chamber of Commerce is raising concerns about a city intersection he says is dangerous after two collisions occurred there in one week, including a fatal crash.

Barry Cooper drives through the intersection of Richmond Avenue E. and Highway 110 in the southwestern Manitoba city frequently and says change is needed.

"It's a conversation that's been going on for some time and it's incredibly sad that a tragedy like this brings it forward again," he said in an interview on CBC Manitoba's Radio Noon on Friday.

Just before 10 a.m. Monday, three vehicles crashed in the intersection — a semi truck, a pickup and a car.

Brandon police Sgt. Kirby Sararas said the person driving the car was pronounced dead at the scene. The pickup driver, a 63-year-old man, was taken to hospital with non-life-threatening injuries. 

The 22-year-old man driving the semi was uninjured, although the vehicle caught on fire.

The next day, two vehicles crashed at the same intersection, but nobody was seriously injured, Sararas said.

Although there are stop signs on the highway at the intersection, Richmond Avenue E. is a through road, with a speed limit of 90 kilometres per hour.

Cooper acknowledges there isn't a large amount of traffic in a 24-hour period, but says it gets busy during rush hour. There are quite a few industrial vehicles coming and going from the fertilizer plants nearby, along with agricultural vehicle traffic, he says.

Road safety review coming next year

There have been numerous accidents in the area over the years, Cooper says, and even more close calls because people get impatient and take chances when they're waiting at the stop sign on the highway behind slow-moving industrial vehicles.

He says people have reached out to him, saying they're avoiding the intersection because it's so dangerous.

A spokesperson from the City of Brandon says the municipal government reached out to Manitoba Infrastructure last year and the department initiated a meeting last November. Following those discussions, the province is planning to conduct a road safety review of the area, which will take a closer look at traffic data and review the existing intersection.

It's expected to start next spring.

Cooper is glad the review is happening, but that still means months before anything happens to address safety concerns.

He hopes traffic lights are installed in the intersection, as do hundreds of others who signed a petition on the website change.org. The petition was started after Monday's fatal crash, and calls for traffic lights at Highway 110 and Richmond. As of Saturday morning, it had more than 1,000 signatures.

"In the short term, even slowing the speed down so that the through traffic, instead of running at 90 kilometres [per hour], maybe they're at 60" would help, he said.

"We have to do something. Even though the frequency of accidents isn't great, the potential for severity is very high."