1% of Milton’s operating budget property taxes is spent on operating and maintaining street lights (another way of saying that out of $1 paid in property taxes to the Town, 1¢ goes towards the operating cost of street lights). 

Is it just me does Milton have a lot of them in some places?  Thompson between the Metro plaza and Derry is lit like a Christmas tree.  Are all these lights really needed?  On some spots 3 lights in a row are blown out and there’s no visible reduction in illumination, that’s how many lights they have.  I’ll take a picture and will post it here. 

Does anyone else feel the same?  Does your town bombard streets with way too many lights?

Is there any Town as small as Milton that has as many traffic lights on major arterial roads disrupting traffic flow?  Driving through Thompson from Derry to Main is an agonizing exercise in patience.  Sadly, Derry on Western part of Milton is turning into the same thing.  Tremaine, Savoline (coming soon), Scott and Bronte.  That’s four lights in about a km and a half.  There’s a busy rail track blocking traffic in between that I did not mention.

Seriously, did these subdivisions need both Scott Blvd and Savoline Blvd? Couldn’t just one connector road in the middle of the subdivision have served the purpose?   It’s not just traffic flow, it makes transit harder too.

It would’ve been better to build connections to Tremaine, Main, Loius St Laurent and Britannia up front to distribute traffic load.  

Milton does have a decent trails plan. But is it integrated as part of a larger transportation network with deadlines?

Ultimately Milton must provide an alternate (read: non-driving) mean of getting from any point in the town to any other point in the town. Only then will many residents consider chugging their cars for bicycles.

However, for that to happen, Milton will have to prioritize alternate means of transportation just as much as it prioritizes roads for cars. I’d like to see Milton transform itself into the most walk-able and bike-able city in Ontario.

The issue of transit came up on a hawthornevillager forum.  Transit absolutely needs to be part of the larger infrastructure plan (which takes into account not only roads, but also walking and cycling). That infrastructure plan itself needs to be a part of a larger Urban Plan.

Click here to expand the rest of this article