Site of deadly Manitoba bus crash was studied in 2006, but a major suggested improvement wasn't completed
CBC
With safety upgrade recommendations for the site of Manitoba's deadliest crash set to be announced this week, CBC has learned the province studied the intersection nearly 20 years ago and chose not to fix a significant highlighted issue because of the cost.
The June 15, 2023, crash left 17 people dead, after a semi and a bus full of seniors from the Dauphin area collided at the intersection of the Trans-Canada Highway and Highway 5, near Carberry.
The tragedy spurred calls for the intersection to be overhauled, with residents in the area saying they had been warning of its dangers for years. The government ordered a full review of the intersection, with the aim of identifying longer-term safety improvements, and is set to announce its recommendations this week.
But a 2006 study of the intersection said the median is too narrow and doesn't meet national standards — a cause of concern that still hasn't been addressed.
"It's really heartbreaking that they've known this long and basically waited until there was a tragic accident two years ago to actually step up and do anything," said Jordan Dickson, whose home is just down the road from where the collision took place.
CBC obtained the two-page 2006 document, which is a summary of the assessment of the intersection, through freedom of information laws. The assessment came after Carberry town council asked the province to examine the intersection, according to the report.
The summary says there were 11 accidents at the intersection over a five-year period. An engineer with the provincial government's traffic engineering branch wrote in the report that rate was "below the level of concern" to meet the criteria for a traffic signal.
The report didn't identify any single specific factor that contributed to the reported collisions, but there were "a number of items that may have contributed to an imperfect driving environment, thus leading to some of the events of concern," the engineer wrote.
One of those concerns was the existing median width, which "doesn't meet today's design standards," the engineer wrote in the report, dated June 22, 2006.
The report said the traffic engineering branch would address some identified issues — such as cutting tall grass that obstructed drivers' views, along with adding median stop bars and a divided-highway warning sign.
But widening the median wasn't on the table, due "to the costs of localized improvements of this nature," the report said.
Nearly 20 years later, widening the median is one of the three options presented in a provincial report released in January 2024. The province has earmarked $12 million to upgrade the intersection.
Adding a roundabout was also presented as an option, as was a restricted crossing U-turn, or RCUT.
That option would eliminate direct left turns from the Trans-Canada and going directly north-south on Highway 5. Instead, drivers would make merges and U-turns to get where they're going.
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