THUNDER BAY – Construction work on four bridges planned for next year could close a section of Highway 61 every night, but allow traffic to flow in both directions during the daytime hours.
The Ministry of Transportation, which is planning to repair the Canadian Pacific overhead at the Thunder Bay International Airport, the Rosslyn Road Bridge and the two Canadian National overpasses, has identified a plan that would only detour highway traffic between Neebing and Broadway avenues at night as the preferred option.
There is no perfect solution, Ministry of Transportation spokesperson Beau Little stressed at a public open house at the Airlane Hotel on Thursday night.
“The travelling public is going to be impacted,” Little said. “We’re trying to minimize those impacts and feel that nighttime alternative is the preferred alternative. It’s the least disruptive to the public.”
At night, the ministry proposes utilizing Neebing Avenue as the primary detour route with traffic directed to Broadway Avenue, where it reconnects with Highway 61 past the construction. During the day, the roadway would remain open but reduced speeds would in place and lane width would periodically be decreased.
Other options explored by the ministry include Highway 61 remaining open only to southbound traffic with northbound vehicles redirected to Neebing Avenue, keeping the highway open to northbound traffic while looping southbound traffic along Arthur Street to 20th Side Road before rejoining the highway via Rosslyn Road and Broadway Avenue or closing the highway while using Broadway Avenue, Rosslyn Road and a new temporary road as a bypass.
In order to detour traffic from the highway onto municipal roadways, Thunder Bay city council would have to pass a resolution in support of the ministry’s proposal.
Coun. Iain Angus said council will have to decide if the extra traffic on city roadways outweighs the convenience of keeping the detour routes as short as possible.
“It’s going to be a balancing act to find the solution that causes the least damage and the least expense and disrupts life the least,” Angus said.
Without council approval, the ministry would have to detour all traffic using only provincial highways – Highway 11/17 and Highway 130.
Many of the hundreds of the residents who attended the house were in favour of the overnight closures, but had ideas to add to the ministry proposals.
“The only thing they got on the table here that has any sense at all is nighttime work. There’s just too much traffic nowadays to be shoving it all down through Westfort and Neebing Avenue,” said George Dow, who lives on West Francis Street in Westfort.
“Actually, what they should be doing is constructing detours on site and handling the traffic on the (highway) right away like it’s done everywhere else, not expecting residential streets to take the impact from all the (highway) traffic.”
Rick Hird, who lives just off Neebing Avenue, suggested having traffic signals installed at the intersection of Neebing and Broadway avenues, as well as at Neebing Avenue and Frederica Street.
“Anybody who lives in the Westfort area along Gore Street, Frederica, Francis will not be able to go to Neebing to make a left turn. Then the people coming off Broadway to Neebing, they can’t turn because they don’t know if the traffic coming down Neebing is going to turn right or go straight to the Bombardier plant,” Hird said.
Little said the ministry is looking to seek a council resolution next month with the contract being tendered in early 2018 to have work ready to start at the beginning of the construction season.
More information about the detour options and extent of the bridge rehabilitation work can be found online.
