New BrunswickWhat is now an intersection with an assortment of pylons, construction vehicles and dug-up road near Rockwood Park will soon be Saint John’s first roundabout. Roundabout at Sandy Point Road and Foster Thurston Drive a tool for ‘calming’ traffic’Nipun Tiwari · CBC News · Posted: Aug 26, 2025 5:00 AM EDT | Last Updated: 2 hours agoThe project will reconfigure the intersection of Foster Thurston Drive and Sandy Point Road near Rockwood Park. (Michael Heenan/CBC)What is now an intersection with an assortment of pylons, construction vehicles and dug-up road will soon be Saint John’s first roundabout. The project will refigure the intersecting Foster Thurston Drive and Sandy Point Road near Rockwood Park and the Millidgeville neighbourhood. The single-lane roundabout is expected to open in late fall.Tim O’Reilly, the city’s director of public works and transportation, said the project is part of a strategy to tackle a list of “traffic calming” requests.The city has been considering roundabouts in some areas since 2020, when it announced a list of locations for potential roundabout, which included one underway now.Discussions about this specific area started in 2010, O’Reilly said.”We had some concerns from the community about speeding in this area and particularly trying to come off of Sandy Point Road,” he said. “We did determine that the speeds were really excessive at the time.”Saint John traffic engineer Tim O’Reilly says roundabouts make good infrastructure because they’re cost-efficient and low-maintenance and offer safety benefits, (Michael Heenan/CBC)In response, the city installed signs that display a driver’s speed in real time and rumble strips on the roads, which cause cars to vibrate uncomfortably when driven over.”But here we are today implementing a roundabout to help reduce speeds and make it safer for turning on and off of the road,” O’Reilly said. Work on the $1.7 million project started in late July and is expected to continue until October.According to staff reports, the Sandy Point and Foster Thurston roundabout is costing less than expected, which allowed the city to reallocate some money to the design phase for a roundabout on Loch Lomond Road at the Airport Arterial. WATCH | Saint John roundabout a response to road safety concerns: Work underway on Saint John’s 1st roundabout Talk about the wheres, whens and hows of roundabouts has been going on at Saint John city hall since 2020. Now, the city’s first roundabout is expected to be finished this fall. O’Reilly said roundabouts make good infrastructure because of their cost efficiency and low-maintenance needs. They also reduce risks that come with some four-way intersections.”It’s an improvement that causes people to have to actually slow down, which decreases the chance of accidents,” he said.”The other benefit is that if accidents occur, instead of being a typical T-bone collision, they’re more of a sideswipe.”Deputy Mayor John Mackenzie said roundabouts are a new way of handling traffic for drivers in the city that some may find hard to get used to.The project will have connections to the Rockwood Park Trail access road and to a driveway to a nearby daycare. (City of Saint John)”But once you’re used to them, I think it’s going to be highly effective and really solve some issues in terms of traffic tie ups and stuff,” he said.This roundabout will have connections to the Rockwood Park Trail and access to a driveway to a nearby daycare. “We want to make sure that when families try to gain access to that daycare they can do so in a safe manner,” O’Reilly said. More speed cushions coming to Saint John after council vote on traffic-calming Last October, the city said it saw an uptick in traffic-calming requests from the community beginning in 2020, when it would get about 20 requests per year.This prompted the city to launch a plan to install traffic-calming measures such as speed cushions and roundabouts in areas with high numbers of complaints about speeding or unsafe driving.City staff say it had more than 50 traffic-calming requests in both 2022 and 2023 and 34 in 2024. So far in 2025, the city said, it has received seven.The city’s budget for the project includes $1.1 million in federal funding.Deputy Mayor John Mackenzie says roundabouts bring a return on investment by incurring less cost for upkeep. (Graham Thompson/CBC)Other major city projects currently underway with more than half their costs paid by the federal government include the Main Street changes and the Retail Drive and Ashburn Lake Road realignment.”You want to do as much as you can when you get that kind of [funding] opportunity that may not be here next year,” MacKenzie said.More roundabouts in the city’s futureCity staff say they are still recommending roundabout installations in four other areas: Rothesay Road at Ashburn Road Somerset Street at Millidge Avenue Manawagonish Road at Gault Road Simms Corner O’Reilly said the roundabout at Loch Lomond Road the Airport Arterial would be a large undertaking and need to align with the future development of the airport and surrounding area.The future of Simms Corner is still uncertain because it’s an intersection of wider interest as a trade corridor. The city is working with the province on updated design options. A spokesperson for the provincial Department of Transportation and Infrastructure said in a statement it had no update on the project.ABOUT THE AUTHORNipun Tiwari is a reporter assigned to community engagement and based in Saint John, New Brunswick. He can be reached at nipun.tiwari@cbc.ca.
Saint John’s 1st roundabout expected to open in late fall
