Business owners worried about Kelly Lake Road being closed from June to October on short notice have some hope following a meeting Monday.
Roads director Dave Shelsted said the business owners were presented with some options, unlike a meeting May 11, when the road closure was presented as a fait accompli.
At that meeting, road engineer Stephen Holmes said the city learned the work would have to be done last fall when the bridge inspector reported the culvert would have to be replaced within a year.
"We had some additional meetings and we had to start the ball rolling to get this bridge replaced as soon as possible, which meant this summer," Holmes said.
"During the design process, we were looking at different options -- whether we could stage the construction as we typically would with a culvert, keeping one lane open on the existing road. But it wasn't possible because of the condition and size of this culvert.
"We didn't come to that decision lightly, but it was made in approximately February and we proceeded with the design on that basis."
When asked why no one in the area was informed between February and May, Holmes admitted it should have been done.
Shelsted agreed.
“We didn't do a great job in communications in this one,” he said Monday. “We're fully admitting that.”
Since the first meeting, Shelsted said they looked at alternatives, such as postponing the work for a year. But while it's still safe now, it wasn't something they were comfortable doing.
They also looked at accelerating construction by working on the project 24 hours a day. But there is certain work that is difficult to do at night, he said, and poured concrete has to sit a certain amount of time to harden properly. It turned out that they would only save a few weeks, while driving up costs up as much as 30 per cent
What may be possible, however, is installing a temporary one-lane bridge that would offer slow access through the area. They would have to get permission from some private landowners and it would add $500,000 to $600,000 to the cost. It would also stretch construction out over two years.
“The vast majority of people said they were in favour of the temporary bridge option,” Shelsted said.
Monday's meeting was an input session, Shelsted said, and staff will flesh out details ahead of another public meeting, which will be held as soon as possible.
“There's a lot of pressure on us to sort this out in short order,” he said. “We want to go in the direction they want us to.”
Some fencing work will be done on the site in the coming days, he said, but it doesn't herald the start of construction. Instead, it's fencing that has to go up regardless to protect wildlife in the area.
