A number of road paving projects have been completed, according to the city’s top administration official, who briefed city council earlier this week.
David Kim reported that sections of Industrial Road 3, 21st Ave S, 17th Ave S, Brookview Crescent & 7th Street South, College Way, 7 th St S, Summit Place, 24th Ave, Mount Connell Crescent, 18th & 19th Ave, 16th Ave S, Cul-de-sac Edgewood Drive, 27A Ave S, 29th Ave S.
For surface pavement and underground utility projects, Anderson Crescent has been completed and open to the public. Sidewalk installation and driveway/laneway restoration is in progress.
Second Street South is making progress and is scheduled to be completed and open by the end of September while 13th Avenue and 5th Street South are scheduled for completion by the week of September 18 and October 2 respectively.
Some projects were deferred to 2018, including 9th street south, 17th Ave., which needs further investigation and repairs due to an unforeseen settlement of an existing sanitary tank, while 16th Ave. could also include water infrastructure upgrades.
Also, Cobham Avenue reconstruction design, planning and stakeholder engagement are underway and set to begin construction next year.
Kim noted that much of the road construction projects are being undertaken by local contractors.
“We looked at projects in different segments so that low capacity contractors can bid against those things,” he said. “Although they had good capacity and skill sets, before the projects were just too big, they were not qualified to bid.
“Now we have a number of small projects, although it takes more effort to person-manage, it gives an opportunity to local contractors.”
Mayor Lee Pratt lauded the changes.
“Kudos to the fact that we changed the bid process and brought it on so that the local people could bid on it and kudos to the locals for bidding on it and securing those contracts,” Pratt said.
“In the last two years, I think we’ve spent just shy of $29 million, including Idlewild, and every one of those projects were local contractors. We made that message loud and clear when we ran in the election and I think we’ve delivered on that.”