Calls to upgrade Highway 138 following latest death

The recent death of a 33-year old woman along a highway near Cornwall, Ont., on which several fatal collisions have previously occurred, has sparked a petition calling for the province to address the community's safety concerns.

Amanda Maloney of Moose Creek, Ont., was killed on the morning of March 29 in a three-vehicle collision on Highway 138 — a single-lane highway between Highway 417 and Cornwall.

Cara Sabourin, a friend of Maloney's, started the petition calling for more turning lanes, traffic cycles, traffic lights and better lighting on that route.

"When I heard the news of Amanda's death, I felt sick to my stomach, I couldn't sleep the whole night. The next morning I woke up and I felt like I needed to do something," she told Radio-Canada.

Sabourin said she doesn't want Maloney's death to be in vain.

"It's not OK that this happened to her. She's got two beautiful girls that are going to be raised without a mother now ... we don't need this to happen to anyone else's mother or children for that matter," she said.

'Heart of gold'

Maloney ran the Boulangerie Swiss Farmer Bakery, on McNeil Road, and her friends say she was heavily involved in the local community. She is survived by two daughters, aged five and seven.

Maloney's obituary described her as "a 'yes' woman who put everyone else before herself without hesitation."

Sabourin said Maloney volunteered her time at the community centre at any events she could. Sabourin added that both of her own kids worked for Maloney for a time.

"When she was looking after them she would send me little messages, as a mom, that I would want to know, 'Oh, they're doing great ... They're doing a great job,'" she said.

"She went out of her way to do things like that."

Pascal Quensel, Maloney's ex-partner and the father of her two children, said she had a "heart of gold."

"She touched everybody. Everybody she met, she impacted, she was such a nice person," he said.

Longstanding concerns

In 2017, Ontario's Ministry of Transportation (MTO) received a report that proposed more than two dozen improvements to the highway, from new turning and passing lanes to roundabouts, carpool lots and flood mitigation infrastructure.

Sen. Bernadette Clement, who said she had encountered Maloney at farmers' markets, was a Cornwall city councillor when that report was presented. She said she was told then that the traffic volumes didn't justify major investments.

"I know from my own personal experience and from speaking to others that we're feeling increasingly unsafe, and so we need to have this conversation again and again," she said.

The lack of action in addressing these longstanding concerns also frustrates Sabourin.

"I hope that people listen to what we're trying to say and realize how hurt we are as a community, that this exact intersection actually has been asked to be fixed before five years ago," she said.

There were 44 collisions reported on Highway 138 in 2022, according to MTO statistics. When Radio-Canada asked the MTO for more recent figures, it was told this information could only be provided through a freedom of information request.

In a statement, Nolan Quinn, MPP for Stormont-Dundas-South Glengarry, said the province will announce new steps to improve safety there later this year.

"I thank our first-responders for their action and extend my deepest condolences to Amanda's family and friends in these difficult times," he said in his statement.