After attending the latest “information session” (not a consulting session), it is clear that High Falls Road will become our northern bypass without the input from all citizens. Under the guise of reconstructing High Falls Road to meet district standards, properties will be expropriated, small buildings will be relocated, ancient rocks will be blasted, trees cut and wildlife habitat destroyed.

In addition to the reconstruction, we will see a bicycle path which will be useless since few cyclists ever use that road (same as the much-touted Trans Canada Trail) and which will have to be maintained.

While it could be argued that a dedicated walking path would be nice, High Falls Road is used mainly by local residents to exercise their pets; a graveled shoulder section would do the job very well. The additional expenditure of millions of dollars for those two items alone flies in the face of town council who cannot find the money to build a sidewalk where it is really needed — along Manitoba Street where students must walk to and from the high school.

High Falls Road is in rough shape and it does need resurfacing, but that is all it really needs. Next, the speed limit for this mainly residential rural road should be reduced to 40 km/h.

Finally, the use of this road by trucks, especially the huge lumber and construction trucks, except for local deliveries should be prohibited. And this is really all that is required. The savings generated by reducing the scope of this project should be used for other projects which are required.

If a northern bypass is needed, then a new road should be constructed in line with the planned new intersection, still on MTO books, near the Ministry of Natural Resources centre access. The current proposal is simply not the answer to the actual need.

Judy and Heinz Puersten

Bracebridge