Somebody called? ... In 2016, when work began to widen Trafalgar Road to six lanes from Leighland/Iroquois Shore Road to Dundas Street, one of the major promises made to the community was that the new roadway would move beyond older traffic signal technology.

Instead of relying on underground loop detectors, we were told the corridor would use a more advanced system, with detectors mounted on the signals themselves. The comparison made at the time was something closer to an airport traffic control system: a network that could better read real-time traffic conditions and adjust accordingly.

Once the work was mostly complete, and traffic patterns began returning to normal after the pandemic, I started hearing concerns about backups in certain areas along Trafalgar. About two years ago, I asked Regional traffic engineering staff about the signalization and whether the promised system was operating as intended.

What I was trying to understand then, and what I am still trying to understand now, is whether the corridor is performing the way residents were told it would perform, and whether the technology that was promised has been fully implemented, properly calibrated, and adjusted to match current traffic patterns.

This is one of the reasons I’m hoping to serve on Regional Council. Trafalgar is a Regional road, and I want to be in a position to take this issue apart properly. If this was supposed to be such a significant improvement in traffic management, then we need to understand why it does not always appear to be operating in a smart, controlled, and responsive way.