**** HRM Media Release
Traffic Calming has changed! A new Traffic Calming Administrative Order (AO) has been approved by Regional Council to better balance emphasis on all road users when considering which streets should receive traffic calming features.
In the past, vehicle speed was the primacy factor for ranking streets in order of implementation. The new policy provides increased emphasis on mode share, pedestrian and cycling infrastructure and collision history.
Traffic Calming for Safer Streets
Go directly to Projects and Assessments
Traffic calming is the installation of physical measures intended to slow vehicles and alter driver behaviour. This means slowing down cars, trucks, and motorcycles by installing measures such as speed humps, speed tables, curb extensions, etc. Traffic calming helps make neighbourhoods safer for non-drivers and is an important part of building healthy walkable communities.
Physical measures consist primarily of vertical and horizontal deflections in the roadway. Examples include:
- speed humps (PDF)
- speed tables (PDF)
- raised crosswalks (PDF)
- curb extensions (PDF)
- lane narrowing (PDF)
- raised median islands (PDF)
- traffic circles or mini-roundabouts (PDF)
- speed cushions (PDF)
- raised intersections
- on-street parking
Traffic calming measures are installed following guidance from the Transportation Association of Canada.
Occasionally temporary traffic calming measures are identified as a near-term need when Capital Works Projects (i.e. paving) are planned for the near term (2-4 years). In these cases, temporary measures may be installed to ‘get ahead of the pavers’, with the intent to test the effectiveness of the measures prior to installing permanent features. Tactical measures are typically used for horizontal deflections, such as bump-outs or corridor narrowing. Temporary (or rubber) speed humps and speed tables are not currently used under this program as they can be easily lifted and damaged by snowplows.
HRM has a team dedicated to using temporary (or tactical) traffic calming measures for street improvement pilot projects.
Traffic Calming Projects and Assessments
View a map of Completed Traffic Calming Projects
2022 Proposed for Implementation(PDF) – as of May 4th, 2022
Current list of Ranked Streets (potential future implementation) (PDF) – as of July 12, 2022
Complete list of Assessments and Status (PDF) – as of July 12, 2022
– *NOTE – find your street and note which stage it is in, then check the status descriptions below to see what that means. Press Ctrl + F to access the Find Function in the pdf file.
Status Descriptions (PDF)
If you want to dig in, you can also read the AO: https://fal.cn/3r6eQ
