The much-needed rehabilitation of Highway 47 is progressing at a good pace according to City officials.
At Monday's regular meeting of council, it was noted that the first phase of the project was finished last week and crews are now focused on replacing the watermains on a section of King Street.
City manager Jim Puffalt said the first phase was comprised of completing the waterline connections under the north portion of Souris Avenue north. That work will ensure that when the City is forced to replace the watermains in that area, they will not need to dig up the road.
Puffalt said that is also the reasoning behind their next phase, which will see crews replace the watermains on King Street from Souris Avenue to Cundall Drive.
"We are replacing the watermain because it is underneath where we want to put new asphalt," he said. "That whole waterline under King Street west needs to be replaced, but unfortunately, all we had this year for funding was enough to get up to Cundall Drive."
Puffalt added that, weather permitting, the job is expected to take two weeks to complete.
"It is going to be an area to avoid if you can. There will be one lane of traffic, hopefully. Unfortunately, part of doing construction and fixing things is that you have to impact people and traffic. We thank everybody for their patience and ask them to find alternate ways around the city if they can, and we'll get out of there as soon as we can."
Along with the watermain replacement, Puffalt said crews will also be replacing the curbs on Souris Avenue north, which he noted were in "terrible shape." He added that since they were replacing the curbs, they also decided to narrow the boulevards along Souris, which will give drivers more room in the future.
"That section of (Souris) narrowed up quite a bit. We're not doing a whole bunch but I think it will be a substantive change for people that they will see when they are driving. It adds about two metres of driving surface on each side. This will widen it up and give more of a standard road surface."
Puffalt said the widening of the road and curb replacement was not part of the original project but something that made sense to do since they were already working in the area. He estimates widening the road will add $112,000 to the overall budget.
Asked when residents can expect paving to begin, Puffalt said all other work must be completed first.
"It's a big project, it's a lot of money and there is a lot of roadwork to do. (Paving) will be awhile but I think people will see progress on a daily basis."
When completed, the north section of Highway 47 from Wellock Road to the train tracks will be repaved.
Along with that work, the City also has a number of other projects underway. One that continues to move at a slow pace is the paving of the Estevan Leisure Centre parking lot. Puffalt said the additional curbing work did pull away some resources from that job, but he was expecting work to resume on July 23. He added, rumours that additional expenses on the Highway 47 project have forced the City to push the parking lot paving to 2014 are false.
