A plan to re-shape the future of a major Nanaimo traffic corridor will be unveiled this Saturday.
Pedestrian crossings, treed medians, improvements to intersections and time-of-day parking are all proposed to improve the stretch of highway from Days Inn Hotel on Nicol Street to Comox Road downtown – at times, visitors’ first glimpse of the Harbour City.
The Terminal Nicol Re-Imagined Committee has been collecting feedback from residents and business owners about how the Terminal-Nicol corridor could be changed since September last year, and will present the final draft in an open house this Saturday before the document is given to Nanaimo city council.
The drop-in event will allow people to see panel boards of what’s proposed, ask questions and take a guided bus tour of the corridor to see where future improvements could happen.
“We’re checking in to make sure we’ve heard what the public said before, that we are in fact on the right path … and if there’s any tweaks, twists or turns or anything we need to add to the report we want to hear about those,” said Darren Moss, chairman of the committee. “We want to make sure that the public supports this as an action item.”
Among improvements, Moss said the section from Esplanade to Comox and Front streets has some of the best potential changes, involving reworking the curb line, medians with trees, cross walk improvements and time-of-day parking, which would involve closing down curbside lanes on the four-lane road outside of peak traffic hours.
The open house is Saturday, Oct. 29 between 11 a.m. to 3 p.m. at Dish Restaurant, 111 Terminal Ave. Bus tours depart from the restaurant hourly between 11:30 a.m. and 2:30 p.m.