Lions Bay mayor wants more barriers on Sea to Sky highway

The mayor of Lions Bay told CBC News on Sunday that her town wanted a barrier to be installed along a stretch of Highway 99 on which two young women were killed in a head-on collision on Saturday.

• Highway 99 reopens after head-on collision kills 2

“We asked for a barrier in that area,” says Lions Bay mayor Brenda Broughton.

“There's no question that if there's a divided highway you've got a scenario that's a safer scenario than without that division.”

In the lead up to the 2010 Winter Olympics in Vancouver, B.C. spent $600 million to widen and straighten certain stretches of the Sea to Sky Highway.

The divider that keeps traffic in respective lanes ends a few kilometres north of Lions Bay, however.

Lions Bay resident Daniel James says the highway has gotten safer, but that the changes might not be enough to end tragedies like Saturday’s fatal accident.

“It’s not the killer highway it once was. But it’s still in some ways, I guess, you could argue that it’s made people go even faster,” he told CBC News.

“God… it doesn’t change, does it?”

Victims were UBC students

The cause of the accident has not yet been determined, says police, but it’s possible that frozen conditions may have contributed to the crash.

On Saturday, Insp. Tim Shields told CBC News that along divided stretches of highway, the chance of a head-on collision occurring drops to nearly zero.

Two young women – both between 19 and 20 – were killed when the northbound Jeep Cherokee they were travelling in to Whistler for the weekend lost control and smashed head-on into a Chevrolet pick-up truck.

RCMP Sea to Sky detachment confirmed Sunday that the driver and a backseat passenger were killed, and that the deceased women are from Ontario and California.

Police also confirmed that at least three of the four women in the Jeep were UBC students.

The driver of the pickup truck had only minor injuries and walked away from the scene.