What’s the scariest patch of road in Metro Vancouver? That was the question put to online readers of The Sun earlier this month.

For some drivers, cyclists and pedestrians, it doesn’t get any worse than Burrard Street at Pacific Street, an intersection nominated by a handful of readers and one of the deadliest in Vancouver.

ICBC data puts the intersection as the second worst spot in the city for crashes from 2009-13. The crash count at this location totalled 716 for those years — the latest released by the insurer — and 277 of them were killed or injured.

Burrard at Pacific

Lon LaClaire, Vancouver’s acting director of transportation, said a high number of collisions is to be expected at high-volume intersections. But there’s something else at play at Burrard and Pacific.

“The layout of the intersection isn’t what people are expecting,” LaClaire said. “So when they encounter it, they aren’t sure exactly how to behave.”

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Visit vancouversun.com/scariestroads to nominate the scariest intersection, roadway or bike path you come across in your commute.

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Eastbound drivers merging onto the bridge from Pacific grit their teeth as they look left for oncoming cars, both ways for bikers and pedestrians and straight ahead for the car merging in front of them. Meanwhile, northbound drivers merging onto Pacific crane their necks to spot cyclists dropping off the sidewalk to cross their exit channel.

“It’s more than just the busyness — it’s the geometry,” LaClaire said. “It’s not a normal intersection.”

Dual left-turn lanes, restricted turns and heavy signage also help make this an intersection police regularly attend to, said Brian Montague, a VPD spokesman.

“There’s just a lot going on,” Montague said. “Driving is a very complex task to begin with. When you come up to an intersection that’s out of the ordinary and not your typical four-way intersection, it makes that task even more difficult. When the task becomes more difficult, we often see more collisions.”

It takes a look back in time to understand how things got so bad at a key thoroughfare such as Burrard at Pacific. When the bridge first opened in the 1930s, it had six driving lanes and two shared sidewalks for cyclists and pedestrians. At that time, northbound traffic deposited through a simple intersection in a neighbourhood filled with single-family homes.

“The streets that were designed back in 1938 certainly made sense at that time. I’m sure that they were doing all the right things,” LaClaire said.

But as highrises went up and Vancouver’s downtown core grew, the traffic increased and the way the bridge was being used began to change. It is now a heavily used walking route for tourists and commuters alike and a busy cycling route. Nearly 4,000 bike trips and 3,000 foot crossings are made over the bridge each day, according to recent counts by the city.

“Suddenly, this is the bridge that is carrying the highest number of people walking and cycling over False Creek, and so now what never used to be a conflict is suddenly a conflict.”