Help Stop Further Development Today!
Sunset Ridge North Access Facts
We are concerned members and neighbours of the Sunset Ridge community and we demand that Cochrane stops Melcor from further development until they have the planned North Access secured. They don’t own the lands for the planned access and don’t want to purchase it so they have proposed an interim solution. Melcor’s proposal was presented June 14th, 2017.
There was a fair bit of concern expressed by the residents of Sunset Ridge regarding the new access point Melcor is planning for the community as describe by the Cochrane Times. People most affected were conveniently not invited, which if you believe the developer was an accident. Without the planned North Access, the current transportation problems will become un-manageable.
We demand that Cochrane stops Melcor from further development until they have the planned North Access secured.
What is Melcor's plan?
The proposed road is drawn in yellow (Figure 01). It will be a small access road in the middle of a neighborhood that connects to highway 22. The existing access of View Ridge Place will be connected to the intersection.
The Original Plan
To understand the consequences of this plan it is required to understand the approved plan and how it handles the traffic. Refer to the "Figure 2" (below), from the approved Sunset Ridge ASP, shows an arterial road (solid blue) which connects two collectors to highway 22.
Wikipedia describes these road types as follows:
1.
Arterials are major through roads that are expected to carry large volumes of traffic.
2.
Collectors collect traffic from local roads, and distribute it to arterials. Traffic using a collector is usually going to or coming from somewhere nearby.
3.
At the bottom of the hierarchy are local roads. These roads have the lowest speed limit, and carry low volumes of traffic.
Melcor wants to replace one arterial and two collectors by one local road.
It also should be noted that this interim road can become permanent because Melcor does not own the lands for the permanent solution.
After the interim road has been constructed Melcor will simply walk away. They don’t take any responsibility for the planned 4-lane road and it is not clear who will ever finance and construct the planned road.
More Development Without any North Access
Melcor plans to develop land for thousands of new people without a North access. This is depicted in "Figure 03" below.
Neighbourhoods 16, 17, 21A, 21B, 22A, 22B, are not yet developed. Parts of 18A, 18B, 19A, 19B, 20A, 20B, 20C don’t have houses yet and people still need to move in. But that is not all. The brown part (28) is a high density multi-family site (condo’s). Existing parts of Sunset Ridge will also get more condo buildings like Sunset Boulevard. Thousands of residents will move in before there is any North access. The density of the original plans was lower, so less traffic.
It must be clear by now. Melcor must be stopped developing further.
Cochrane can stop this by withholding permission because the road is not available before 2019 and because the permanent road can not be secured.
More issues with Melcor’s proposed road
- The Cochrane North Area Structure Plan, Sunset Ridge Stage Two Area Structure Plan, Sunset Ridge Stage Two Neighborhood Plan and Cochrane North ASP and Hamlet Plan Transportation Study describe the Sunset Ridge North access on the section line. Why do we make expensive plans and don’t follow them?
- The proposed North access does not have enough capacity.
- The proposed North access does not meet the criteria set out in the Alberta Transportations Highway Geometric Design Guide Section I.4.3. These guidelines are there for safety.
- The proposed North access does not meet the criteria, 400m minimum space between road and access, as set out in the Alberta Transportations Highway Geometric Design Guide Section per I 5.3. These guidelines are there for safety.
- The South access is very busy and the proposed interim North access is planned for 2019. The interim access will take a long time because two Area Structure Plans and the Neighborhood Plan must be changed. Getting permission from Alberta Transportation, Rocky View County and Cochrane will take time and expected court cases against Alberta Transportation (if they approve the proposal that violates their own rules) will further delay construction.
- The interim road will become permanent because Melcor is not interested in purchasing the lands for the planned 4-lane access.
- After the interim road has been constructed Melcor will simply walk away. They don’t take any responsibility for the planned 4-lane road and it is not clear who will ever finance and construct the planned road.
- The Sunset Ridge plan includes a commercial node and a school. Because the North part will not be developed there is only one commercial node available for the whole development.
- The northern access needs a wide 4-lane road to provide access to the future growth lands as specified in the ASP. The proposed interim solution cannot function as such and this means that growth to the North becomes more difficult and costlier.
- The planned closure or right-in-right-out of range-road 43 to Highway-22 and the increased traffic coming from the Hamlet and Cochrane North will make Township Road 263 a primary collector. It is not acceptable that this collector contains two 90-degree bends within 230 meters. Building a proper road and buying the required land later is costly and all cost are on the taxpayer.
- The widening of highway 22 will be delayed. The quarter SW23 26 04 W5M becomes land-locked and land needs to be expropriated to access this quarter. The East part of the interim road needs to go over private land which will need to be purchased or expropriated.
- The View Ridge Place access, that has been financed with the purchase of the people’s acreage, will be crippled by two 90-degree bends and it is not even clear if the road will be paved.
- View Ridge Place runs East-West with deep ditches and therefore the snow blows nicely over the road. The part that will be added runs North-South and there will be a problem with snow drifts. Access to the 22 on windy and snowy days like October 2nd 2017 will be limited. Residents must wait for someone to clear the snow.
- The interim road is not safe for people who need to access to their property. Traffic from Sunset Ridge to the 22 North will use the acceleration lane but on the end of this lane there are two drive ways.
There are so many things wrong with this interim access. Ordinary people have to follow all the rules while Melcor uses all its money and influence to go around the rules. Cochrane and Alberta Transportation must stop this.
About Alberta Transportation
All of Alberta's provincial highways are maintained by Alberta Transportation (AT), a department of the Government of Alberta. Brian Mason Minister of Transportation and Minister of Infrastructure is responsible for the department.
AT uses the “Highway Geometric Design Guide” as a guideline for development. The foreword starts with this sentence: “The purpose of this guide is to promote uniformity for highway design in Alberta and to encourage the provision of safe and efficient roads for the well-being of the travelling public and society in general.”
Let’s look how the interim road stacks up against this guide
- The interim road is only 200m from two access points and less than 400m from a section line. The rule, as described in figure I-5.3, is that the road is at least 400m from the section line. That is not the case. A very dangerous situation occurs when the road and access points are too close. AT follows those rules rigorously as they have done with the quarter SE22 26 04 W5M. The owner had to remove his access to the highway and connect to View Ridge Place which is on the section line because it was less than 400 meters from the road.
- The interim road is not efficient. Because the road is not on the section line, twinning will create extra cost and delays. The road is not efficient for View Ridge Place residents. View Ridge Place is already on the section line and now it is moved away from the section line. This is unprecedented.
- The guide lines describe temporary as “Temporary means of access should be avoided, particularly in cases where the proposed activity upon the land will be of a permanent nature and sensitive to a future change of access location. When a temporary access is to be considered, the application should clearly state the temporary nature and a defined time limit.” The interim road violates these rules, cannot have a defined time limit, and is not in the well-being of the travelling public and society in general.
We demand that Cochrane stops Melcor from further development until they have the planned North Access secured.
About Melcor
Melcor has stated several times that the planned road is too expensive and they can’t afford it. Their financial result as published at the TSX don’t show that.
Melcor is a public (TSX: MRD) successful real estate company. With revenues over the last 2 years of $252M per year and an average gross margin of 45% and an average net margin of 21.5% they beat companies like Exxon and Apple:
Average revenue over the last two years was 252M Per year with an average net profit of 55M per year.
See the 2015 and 2016 TSX results below: