The complete realignment of the path near Grandview Arena could take a few weeks to complete, says the city’s park planning co-ordinator.
The City of Thunder Bay continued its 32 kilometre path rehabilitation project of area trials including paths near Boulevard Lake and Country Fair Plaza. Werner Schwar, co-ordinator for city park planning, said they planned to realign the path near Hinton Street and Madeline Street to make the path safer.
Construction would start sometime this week with clearing of some of the trees and bush near the path he said.
"Cutting down trees is a safety issue that’s why we’ll be shutting down a those sections of the trail while construction begins," Schwar said. "Currently the trail is really close to the river bank in some places. It doesn’t really allow the natural habitat to thrive in that environment."
Schwar added the other reason for construction is to move the path further away to improve path stability with cracks that become bigger each year.
Todd Barey, estimator with Bruno’s Contracting LTD, said the construction could take up to three weeks to complete, depending on the weather and would begin sometime on Monday or Tuesday. He said the goal is to make the trail straighter and eliminating the sharp curves that prevent bicyclists from seeing further ahead.
"It’s basically a total realignment," Barey said. "It’s a lot more of cutting down trees compared to the other trials. It is like a total reconstruction of the trial. We’re going to be in there cutting tress for about a week or so and then we’ll see how it goes from there."
Barey said it hadn’t been determined whether construction would start closer to Hinton Street or Madeline. The decision would follow after city officials inspected the path, he said.
