ERIN ‒ During an update on the Erin and Hillsburgh wastewater system construction, some councilors shared concerns about the scope of work shown in the newly revealed designs.
Presented by Nick Colucci, director of infrastructure services, Colucci said the construction is well underway “despite some delays in starting parts of the work,” during a council meeting Thursday afternoon.
But whereas the presentation showed things were on track, many councillors were shocked by the weight of work pictured in the current mock-ups.
“I’ve been involved in construction and liaison group meetings and business impact group meetings, endless hours involved in discussions,” said Coun. Cathy Aylard. “This is the first time that I’ve seen a photo like this.”
Aylard said it was "shocking."
A “tunneled project,” the picture shows what the eight shafts proposed along Main Street between the Elora Cataract Trail entrance and Wellington 124 will look like during construction.
Some sections will require a widening of the road opposite the shaft.
“It’s basically a very large manhole and that is drilled out,” said Colucci, during the meeting. “At each shaft, we do have a traffic diversion so that we can maintain two lanes of traffic.”
Coun. John Brennan asked why the mock-ups showed no road access whereas all their plans proposed two lanes of traffic open during the construction.
“The size of our shaft is about half of the size (in the presentation),” said Colucci. “So generally, ours are smaller but there will be a crane, there will be pipes piled up and a sea container or two for storing equipment.”
All construction areas will have a detour to the east or west allowing two lanes of traffic past road closures on Dundas, Lawrence, and Scotch Street.
The Main Street truck detour will take trucks to Winston Churchill Boulevard.
“Our shafts are mostly rectangular whereas this one is a very narrow shaft so there’s a lot of stuff happening there,” said Colucci. “But yes, generally (these pictures are) what they look like.”
Brennan also had concerns about how this project would mesh with other road construction needs.
“(We have to) ensure that we have a plan so that as we go forward we mesh these things as seamlessly as possible,” said Brennan. “Just so we don’t have people detouring around a detour, around a detour, around a detour kind of effect.”
Coun. Jamie Cheyne asked a "pointed question" about the Scotch Street closures and how they will impact the Erin Fair.
“That picture doesn’t bode well, obviously it’ll be a busy weekend but I’m just worried about the amount of cluster for that certain weekend,” said Cheyne. “(Since) we get a lot of people coming and going, (we need to) work with the people doing the work to make sure it’s as clean and tidy as possible.”
Colucci said that the contractor has agreed to clean that area up as much as possible fair weekend and that the school gates will remain accessible.
Isabel Buckmaster is the Local Journalism Initiative reporter for GuelphToday. LJI is a federally-funded program.