Despite large volumes of private and industrial traffic on Northern B.C. highways - with more commercial traffic expected as resource projects ramp up across the north - most of the double lane highway between the Alberta border and Prince Rupert carries a class B designation when it comes to its winter maintenance schedule.
The winter maintenance schedule is determined by the province, setting the standard for local highway maintenance contractors along the way. Class B highways are maintained to a lower ploughing frequency standard than class A highways.
Although Hwy. 16 from the Alberta border to Prince Rupert is listed among the province’s primary highway systems, it doesn’t receive class A certification.
Highway classification is determined primarily by traffic volume according to the following formulas provided by the Ministry of Transportation:
“Class A - high volume traffic (over 5000 winter average daily traffic count) or commuter routes and certain expressways and freeways through mountain passes as determined by the province. They are heavy commuter traffic routes extended to include the bulk of vehicles commuting daily to a centre and cut-off where traffic drops below 2500 winter average daily traffic count.”
“Class B - all trunk and main routes (or portions thereof as designated by the province) not included in class A, with a cut-off traffic volume of 1000 winter average daily traffic count.”
There are no class A sections of highway near Burns Lake. The closest is the short four lane section of Hwy. 16 running through Smithers.
A significant difference between class A and class B certification relates to permissible snow depths and the length of time that can exist between when conditions develop and when attempts must begin to remedy them.
Ministry of transportation engineering staff monitor volumes annually, a ministry spokesperson added, with a detailed review held every three years.
Doug Donaldson, Stikine NDP MLA, recently called on the province to re-designate Hwy. 16 as a class A highway.
However, Nechako Lakes MLA, John Rustad has been concerned with increased traffic volumes long before this winter’s run of terrible accidents.
“I’ve been looking at this for a while now,” Rustad said. “I’ve spoken to the minister [of transportation] about it. It’s class B but I believe there are stretches of it that are the busiest class B in the province.”
Highway 16 through the Nechako Lakes (Vanderhoof to Houston) riding has seen many safety-related improvements over the past few years, including an almost complete resurfacing of the highway last year, as well as the addition of turning lanes, passing lanes, deceleration and accelerations lanes, improved lighting, and the installation of more highway webcams feeding into live highway conditions monitoring on DriveBC.
In the fall of 2011, a turning lane was added at the intersection of the Augier forest service road and Hwy. 16, a location that had seen a number of accidents previously, particularly in winter white-out conditions.
The increased maintenance costs associated with reclassifying Hwy. 16 as class A were not available at press time. See next week for more details.