Fourth Avenue will be a four-lane road between Ogilvie Street and Second Avenue once again after city council voted 5-1 Monday evening to have the lines repainted.

Coun. Dave Stockdale was the lone vote against the move at the special meeting. Coun. Bev Buckway was absent from the meeting.

'I know this is a major, major change. It's only been a week,' Stockdale said, going on to suggest more time should be given to adjust to the changes.

He said he wouldn't be against changing the artery back to four lanes if the new system proved to be a problem over the long term.

'I think we should give it some time,' he said.

The vote to go back to four lanes was met with applause from several members of gallery. They had spoken out against the recent changes that saw the road changed to two directional lanes with a centre turning lane and bike lanes on either side.

The changes are part of the federal transportation showcase, where the city receives up to $700,000 from Transport Canada for projects that would help reduce greenhouse gas emissions.

'You have taken that street and turned it into a nightmare,' Jodi Richardson told council prior to Coun. Dave Austin's motion for the lines to be repainted back to four lanes.

Though she said there was discussion before the changes were made, many people didn't comprehend what it would look like until it was altered, she said.

Travelling from the Wharf on Fourth near Robert Service Way to the other end of Fourth Avenue at Second Avenue took 45 minutes during rush hour last Friday, she said.

It was a statement Stockdale took issue with. In the six trips he made Monday on the street, he argued, it took him only eight minutes at worst to get from Hawkins Street to Second Avenue.

'You don't think that Friday was maybe an unusual day in that circumstance and given some time, things may ease up?' he asked.

Richardson argued during rush hour traffic has been consistently backed up further than it was previously since the new lines were painted.

Leo Martel pointed out the majority of the tourist traffic hasn't even hit town yet.

Richardson also mentioned the potential for accidents on the street due to the new lane system.

'I have watched, in the last week, near misses of accidents that were just solely of a result of the confusion people have,' she said.

She attributed an accident just outside her store earlier on Monday, The Wharf on Fourth, to the new lanes.

'God help us if there is an emergency vehicle along the way and one of us is supposed to move over,' she said. 'If there is a bike there, we're going to hit it. If we go into the middle, we're at the risk of being in an accident as well.'

The project is also doing little to reduce greenhouse gases as residents take longer alternative routes like Robert Service Way onto the Alaska Highway or sit and wait in traffic for longer periods on Fourth Avenue, she added.

Another delegate told council he's seen drivers using the Canadian Tire parking lot as a route to escape Fourth Avenue. This could mean an accident for people coming out of the store and walking across the parking lot, he said.

There's no doubt the situation has created a bottleneck, one delegate said.

The situation could impact business like the Wharf on Fourth as well, she suggested.

Richardson pointed to a statement the city's manager of engineering, Wayne Tuck, made in a radio interview that an effort was being made to reduce traffic on Fourth Avenue by 25 per cent. That could potentially harm her ability to do business by 25 per cent, she said.

'People won't stop and get off Fourth Avenue to make a little stop at the grocery store or to make a little stop at the video store if it means they have to fight to get back on that street,' she said.

'So they'll go to the video store in Porter Creek, they'll go to the video store in Riverdale. They'll go up to Granger or out the other way, but they're sure as heck not going to stop on Fourth Avenue.'

Another business owner pointed to problems delivering fuel to a Fourth Avenue address due to the three-lane road.

After the delegation session, the city's manager of operations, Dennis Shewfelt, delivered a report to council detailing the background on why the changes were made.

He noted one part of the city's transportation showcase project called for a road diet to help eliminate barriers in cycling and pedestrian travel. This has included changes to Quartz Road and the roundabout on Robert Service Way at Fourth Avenue.

The showcase is also designed to encourage shared forms of transit like the bus system or vehicle pooling. The three year project began last summer.

The report notes if the city was not to implement the changes in the funding agreement with the federal government, it would have to be renegotiated.

This morning, Shewfelt said the implications from last night's vote on the federal deal are still unknown.

Because the Fourth Avenue initiative is a fairly small portion of the overall showcase project, Mayor Ernie Bourassa said, he doesn't believe there will be serious problems going back to four lanes on Fourth Avenue from Second to Ogilvie.

'I don't care what the implications are in terms of the showcase program because I don't think they're serious at all,' he said.

He compared the current situation to a funnel. 'If you reduce the size of that funnel exit, only so much water can get out.'

That exit has been squeezed to the point that 'all that water's backing up,' he added. 'It now has to be open up.

'It's an absolute bottleneck,' Austin said in proposing his motion, which was greeted with applause.

While the two directional lanes and a centre turning lane seem to work 'on paper' and in other jurisdictions, it isn't working in Whitehorse, he said, adding he's also spent time on the road.

Though the three lanes may work if there are many people turning, it doesn't seem to function well when everyone is going in the same direction, he added.

Coun. Jan Stick has found her time is better cycling or driving down Fourth Avenue from Robert Service Way with the newly-painted lanes to her Well Read Books store prior and after the morning and afternoon rush. However, she said she can see the problems of the bottleneck traffic from her store.

'I guess we get so used to two lanes we forget who has the right-of-way,' she said. She's seen people who have the right-of-way stopping to permit others to go ahead, Stick added.

She's also heard from people, mainly cyclists, who support the new system.

The traffic problems around Ogilvie Street and Fourth Avenue amazed Coun. Doug Graham, who said he didn't see another way to get around the issue.

While the move was met with approval by most in the gallery, Mike Benoit was disappointed.

'I'm choked,' he said following the meeting. 'I lived here all my life and you actually see some progress being made to try and help the environment and try and help the people living in this community, but you get shot down.'

The bike lanes made it safer to cycle downtown, he said.

In voting to move back to four lanes from Ogilvie to Second, council also voted to have staff look at the possibility of one-way streets on Second and Fourth.

'I have favoured the one-way option from day one,' Austin said.

Richardson spoke on the possibility earlier in the meeting.

If the city wants to improve traffic around the city, she suggested Fourth and Second could be one way with traffic flowing in a different direction on each.

'You got your three lines, you got your bike lanes,' she said of the one-way proposal. 'You want to turn left, you move to the left lane. You want to turn right, you turn to the right lane.'

Shewfelt was unsure how much repainting the lanes would cost. He expects to have a plan in place for the repainting by the end of the week.