Kelowna

Photo: Wayne Moore - Castanet

Motorists who frequent Kelowna's downtown core will notice some changes along Pandosy Street.

All-way stop signs have gone up at the intersection of Pandosy Street and Lawrence Avenue.

Similar signs will appear at Pandosy and Leon Avenue within the next week or so.

These all-way or three-way stops will be permanent fixtures at both intersections.

Up until now traffic flowed continuously along Pandosy from Harvey to Bernard Avenue, with stop signs situated on the cross streets of Leon and Lawrence Avenues.

City engineering traffic technician, Laurens Campbell says the changes have been contemplated since traffic downtown was re-aligned for the new William R. Bennett Bridge.

"We couldn't have implemented this previously because the traffic volumes were much higher on Pandosy and it would have backed up traffic into the Bernard intersection," says Campbell.

"Once they altered the access to the highway it became much more viable for this."

Campbell says the all-way stop signs could be in place for up to a year while design work is done to re-configure both intersections.

"What we hope to do is rebuild the corners at that location with nodes similar to what you see on the re-built section of Bernard where it is narrowed somewhat for the pedestrians."

He says the goal is to eventually install three-way flashers at the intersections.

Currently, the intersections are only equipped with flashers in one direction.

The intersection at Pandosy and Lawrence is notorious for crashes - most caused by vehicles blowing through the stop sign on Lawrence.