Martin C. Barry
Grande-Côte Road is about to become the only street in Rosemère where motorists will be allowed to keep driving at 50 km/h for the time being – except in school zones – following speed limit changes approved last week by Rosemère town council.
40’s the new 50
According to an amendment to by-law 781 passed by the council members, the 50 km/h speed limit on Rosemère’s main arteries (Bouthillier Blvd., Montée Lesage, Grande Côte Rd., Montée Sanche and Roland Durand Blvd.) will be dropping to 40 km/h, except in school zones where it will be 30 km/h.
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For now, Grande-Côte will be the exception. In addition to being one of Rosemère’s most travelled main streets, Quebec Route 344 passes along Grande-Côte Rd. As such, the town can’t change the speed limit without obtaining permission from the Quebec Ministry of Transport.
Following example
Until recently, Rosemère had only two speed limits: 30 km/h in school zones and on side streets, and 50 km/h on the main streets. The introduction of the new 40 km/h limit will bring Rosemère’s speed limits into conformity with those in surrounding municipalities.
“All the cities around us in the MRC changed their speed limits to 40 km/h a few years ago,” Mayor Eric Westram said in an interview last week with the North Shore News. “So we were asking ourselves why we’re still at 50?”
New speed warnings
For the streets where the speed limits can be changed immediately, implementation will still require the town to post signs indicating for the first 30 days that a new speed limit is being introduced.
Only after this will it officially take effect. “This would mean that basically the new speed limits will be enforced beginning in the first week of January,” Mayor Westram said.
In another change made by town council that could affect many residents of Rosemère, council amended by-law 801 in order to allow “Tempo” winter car shelters, as well as shelters covering private sidewalks, to be kept up for about a month longer at winter’s end.
‘Tempo’ shelter extension
Whereas a previous version of the by-law required property owners to take down the shelters by April 1, the amended by-law will now allow them to remain up until May 1. The earliest date each year when the shelters can be put up is Nov. 1.
“For the last four or five winters, winter has lasted a lot longer and people were not in a position to remove their shelters,” Mayor Westram explained. Although several times in recent years the town decreed one-week extensions to the normal deadline, the amended by-law formally puts into place a one-month extension to May 1.
More public consultations
During a portion of the meeting reserved for statements by town councillors, Councillor Philip Panet-Raymond said a question that has been asked constantly by many Rosemère residents since the 2017 election is: What will be happening to the Rosemère golf course?
With that in mind, the town has held several public consultations since the election to seek feedback from residents on the direction they feel Rosemère should be taking in terms of its long-term vision for urban planning.
Reconciling visions
As such, said Panet-Raymond, the town will be holding yet another consultation, with sessions taking place on Wednesday Feb. 19 from 6:30 to 9:30 pm at the Externat Sacré Coeur, and on Saturday Feb. 22 from 9 am to noon in the same venue.
The focus will be on two fairly distinct axes: firstly Grande Côte Rd. in central Rosemère with its charming “village” atmosphere; and secondly the Place Rosemère commercial sector, Labelle Blvd. and the golf course area.
“The objective of these final public consultations is to reconcile the town’s vision with that of its citizens in order to finalize the urban development planned that will govern how we as a town address potential and pending changes,” he said.
