Those who regularly drive Highway 16 West have been begging for an investigation into its winter maintenance, which they claim is woefully lacking.
Appeals to politicians and road contractors have so far led nowhere, but this week's tragedy and the ensuing coverage provided by The Citizen, has brought the situation into sharper focus.
There are times during the business of covering news that difficult decisions must be made, and such was the situation on Tuesday when an accident on a perilous stretch of Highway 16 caused three deaths.
The Citizen's photographer returned from the scene with heartbreaking photos, one depicting one of the victims under a tarp.
The victim's name was Darcy Popowich, he was 72, a family man and, even more devastating, a second accident victim was his son Nick.
Editorial staff reviewed the photo of and a debate ensued - should we run it?
Do we protect the man's loved ones or do we hopefully enable his death to have some meaning?
We opted for the latter and, as expected, people reacted.
A few of Darcy Popowich's family members had the admirable strength, grace and respect to visit The Citizen's publisher to voice their concerns. They were obviously disturbed by the image, but they nonetheless listened as it was explained we felt compelled to shake up the complacent.
Unfortunately, it's not enough to run images of crunched cars and emergency personnel.
People need to get angry, and while we expect some of that anger to be directed towards the messenger, we also deeply hope that for every person who points to The Citizen as the culprit for hurting the family, 10 more ask questions of our MLAs - most notably the minister of transportation who must surely know of the history of that roadway.
The most recent tragedy - and the undeniability of that image - has already led the public and at least one local MLA to refocus on this particular stretch of road and to take action.
In a follow up story this week, MLA John Rustad said he's pushing for a different maintenance arrangement between two divisions of Yellowhead Road and Bridge since he's concerned that span is being treated as a lower priority.
So what is the maintenance schedule for this area? And what does the company think of reorganizing?
That's as yet undetermined because the lone spokesperson for Yellowhead Road and Bridge is not available, we're told. We hope to hear from representatives soon since the public has a habit of filling in the blanks when such serious allegations are merely left hanging.
In the meantime, drivers also need to understand why they must slow down in winter weather - an emergency respondent tells of vehicles actually passing him as he rushed to the scene of another accident.
It's clear some drivers aren't getting the picture, so it falls on us to provide one for them.
