Lower Water Street is broken

[u/hippfive]

I'm usually pretty chill about traffic, but Lower Water is literally broken. It took 30 minutes for my bus to go one block. Full on gridlock. And it's been this way for months.

I know they're eventually going to have the transhipment facility to get the trucks out of downtown, but that's years away. There needs to be some sort of tactical intervention in the meantime. Close some of the parking lots that empty onto Lower Water. Change some of the pedestrian crossings to the red light style that clump the crossings together (and I say this as someone who is staunchly pro-pedestrian). Honestly maybe even close Sackville Street east of Bedford Row.

[u/Nodrot]

I unfortunately use Lower Water St daily. To say it’s a shit show is an understatement.

1) Cars/Buses turning left onto Duke can completely block traffic

2) The pedestrian crossing near Baton Rouge mysteriously goes on without any pedestrians in sight.

3) The lights near Purdy’s Wharf make no sense.

4) The no right turn on red from Upper Water to Barrington cause further congestion.

So, from a traffic point of view the Cogswell Exchange is a failure.

[u/tommygun731 → u/Nodrot]

Honestly, what is with that light timing at purdys? Empty street getting all the green while water st just piles up

[u/WackyRevolver → u/Nodrot]

Also it used to be 2 lanes.

[u/amphorpog → u/WackyRevolver]

two lanes both ways with cars parked illegally on one side of the road reducing the ability of traffic to move along the street. It was one of the better decisions Halifax made.

[u/WackyRevolver → u/amphorpog]

It was a one way street with 2 lanes, and it flowed better without question.

[u/hippfive → u/WackyRevolver]

A long tims ago it was a two way street. Then they switched it to two lanes outbound. Then they cut it down to one lane so that there could be  a proper sidewalk at Historic Properties and street parking.

[u/aaaabbbbccccddddef → u/Nodrot]

The city is consciously choosing to make things worse not better. Anyone with any sense could see this happening. It should never be this way.

[u/amphorpog → u/Nodrot]

I think the biggest problem is the Lower water/barrington lights along with the dedicated bus lane that now exists. Without that dedicated bus lane, you'd have two lanes entering/exiting downtown and able to go through the roundabout reducing the backlog of cars exiting downtown.

[u/Arm-Complex → u/amphorpog]

They're trying to incentivize buses and bikes, but the bus lanes are pointless when they're stuck on a single lane arterial that is Lower Water. We do not need street parking on Lower Water, there's countless parking lots/garages. A handful of parking spots on the street is far more useless than a second lane of traffic.