SUNDRE – Alberta Transportation and Economic Corridors’ major redesign of Highway 27-Main Avenue through Sundre’s downtown is not only nearly finished, but way ahead of the originally anticipated timeline.
“The project is ahead of schedule,” said Basir Saleh, senior project manager with AECOM, the consulting firm working with TEC alongside contractor PME to complete the long-anticipated project.
“We’re hoping that by middle of August … we should be crossing the finish line,” Saleh told the Albertan on July 24.
That’s approximately two months ahead of schedule.
“I think that has to do with a lot of great work across the board from everybody, but also the patience from the public and the day-to-day users,” he said.
“People are really understanding in terms of, yes, it’s a short-term pain for a long-term gain. And that’s been fantastic,” he said.
“There’s a lot of individuals that are just rolling down their windows saying, ‘Hey, this looks great.’ And that typically doesn’t happen too often,” he said.
“So when it happens on a project like this, it’s amazing.”
Saleh also praised the contractor for doing an “excellent job” and TEC for providing a “strong vision” as well as the municipality’s cooperation and commitment to keeping the public informed throughout the process.
“It’s just been a very collective, collaborative project, which has been fantastic in the synergy across all parties,” he said.
“When you have a project like this as complex as it was, you need everybody rolling in the same direction.”
The engineer cited several factors that have facilitated a far earlier-than-expected completion. First among them was getting such an early start at the beginning of March, which was followed by a long period of good weather that permitted crews to progress at pace.
“I think that really helped the project move along very quickly,” he said.
“We were able to make some strong gains … usually the month of June and July with the rainy season and everything else, typically is a bit of a challenge.”
By and large, a bulk of the work was already done by the time recent rains materialized.
Along the way, there was some additional work included in the contract, such as further improvements to the ramps on both sides of the Red Deer River bridge as well as a further extension on the sidewalks to the west.
“We’re close to the finish line,” he said, adding that efforts over the coming week will mainly involve a final push to tackle the rest.
“But beyond that, afterwards there’s going to be clean up of the site and taking care of the detours and getting that to what it was before.”
However, motorists better not have grown overly accustomed to the paved westbound detour road that connected 1st Avenue NW, or Myron Thompson Avenue, with Highway 27 from behind Dairy Queen.
“That’s going to be ripped up” and “brought back to its original condition,” said Saleh.
That route was designed as a temporary detour and never meant to remain permanent as it would inevitably end up being used as a short-cut that doesn’t have a proper intersection on Highway 27-Main Avenue.
“The intent was always a short term-detour,” he said, adding it served its purpose well.
With the first and larger phase of the major overhaul of Highway 27 through Sundre almost done, plans remain underway to tackle the second phase on the west side intersection of Highways 22-27-584 and 10th Street SW, also known as Range Road 54, where a regular roundabout is expected as early as next year.
“If everything lines up, the intent is to get that completed as well,” he said.
But for now, Saleh seemed glad to be so near to completing the first phase.
“It’s been a fun job.”
Visit sundre.com/p/hwy-27 for complete project details and updates.
