The city's annual traffic count has verified what many Steinbach residents already know; traffic on Old Tom Road is up sharply since it was paved in 2016. Chief Administrative Officer Troy Warkentin presented the report to city council this week.

"Generally it is showing that from 2015, at which point Old Tom Road was still a gravel-surfaced roadway, to today, traffic levels have increased quite significantly. The expectation obviously is it has a lot to do with the hard-surfacing of the street."

Traffic at the corner of Old Tom Road and Park Road has increased from 261 vehicles per hour to 542 during peak periods.

At the intersection of Old Tom and Loewen Boulevard, the number has gone from 415 per hour to 649 during peak hours.

For the first time, the city also looked at traffic numbers on Hespeler Street at Loewen Boulevard after getting complaints of long wait times at the stop sign on Hespeler at Loewen. It shows 787 vehicles per hour use that intersection during peak hours. Warkentin says the traffic consultants also looked at wait times at the stop sign.

"Based on the analysis and the study of the intersection, it was determined that it is operating at an acceptable level of service and traffic control modifications are not warranted at this time."