What sort of changes would you like to see done to this interchange. It is a good point, very close proximity to Marda Loop shopping area. There is a straightforward pathway from the site to the interchange, and at least there are sidewalks and pretty generously sized islands for pedestrians. But yeah, it is a bit basic and uncomfortable.
The main thing would be to reduce crossing points where speeding cars interact with 2,500+ new potential pedestrians. For starters drop both these slip lanes - someone exiting Crowchild and entering the area should have an immediate visual queue that they are no longer on an expressway and it's time for 40km/h as they are entering an urban area. Make it far more obvious there's a highway and there's a community distinction.
SB Crow to WB 33rd is most egregious - swooping slip lane plus a long merge lane to maintain speed is wildly out of context and only a recipe for dangerous crossings and high-speed traffic noise.
Next - fix all these things that I put in a category of - "what are we even doing here? Do we have no policy at all? How did an engineer sign off on this?"
Ramps not aligned to crosswalks. Crosswalks randomly with curbs in the middle. If a person in a wheelchair dared to cross here, they'd have to leave the crosswalk.
Similarly on the east side off Crowchild, but worse. No ramps at all. Isn't there a BRT station a half-block from here? Do we not have rules to create pedestrian access here? It's literally impassable with a wheelchair - even before we get to the high-speed cars turning all over the place!
Those are just the minimum mandatory things just to kill and injure less people over the coming decades. Now the more material stuff to widen and protect all sidewalks, including if that means losing vehicle queue and travel capacity, although you likely could keep all the lanes as they are overly wide by at least 20 - 50cm each. Shrink all that down and tighten up all dimensions, while giving that excess space to generous sidewalks.
We could get fancier with a bunch of urban design slickness, but I'd say just add a ton of trees and greenery everywhere around to help muffle the visual, noise and air pollution that comes with this interchange.
In the long run, convert 33rd Avenue west of Crowchild into the urban fabric instead of a random overbuilt expressway style arterial and add actual development to the street by removing the greenspace to the north of the avenue and replace with mid-density housing like this proposal. Community will flip out of course but again - we are increasingly a major metropolitan region with long-term growth pressures. Putting as many people as possible in areas like this is a no-brainer. With the upgrades coming to Richmond Green, it's a major park destination, we don't need this remnant right-of-way setback adjacent to it.
