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Lakeland highways included in provincial priorities

Highways and bridges across the Lakeland are getting provincial attention.
The City of Cold Lake and Cold Lake First Nations are working together to get something done about Hwy. 28.

Highways and bridges across the Lakeland are getting provincial attention.


Alberta Transportation recently released their 2018 Construction Program for highway and water management projects across the province, and six local highways and bridges made the list.


“Unfortunately, we can’t address every highway everywhere. But we had enough concerns coming in about specific roads, clearly it’s important that the government looks at them and starts to address those concerns,” said Bonnyville-Cold Lake MLA Scott Cyr. 


The Beaver River Bridge on          Hwy. 41 south of La Corey will be undergoing bridge deck rehabilitation, and an intersection that has received a lot of public feedback is also being reviewed.


The Hwy. 28 intersection at Fort Kent is scheduled to be evaluated. The province is hoping that by improving the intersection, they will be enhancing public safety along a busy industrial corridor.


But that wasn’t the only intersection along Hwy. 28 the MD of Bonnyville was hoping the province would consider.


“We put in another request to make sure that they look at the Ardmore intersection as well. We have put those two together because that’s a problem. Neither one has sufficient signage, people are confused when they come up to either one,” Reeve Greg Sawchuk said. “Both have been the locations of accidents in the past.”


About 20-kilometres of Hwy. 657 will be in the design phase of repaving, and Hwy. 892 will also see some much-needed attention. This highway has also been slotted in for repaving design between Hwy. 28 and four-kilometres south of                             Hwy. 55, and Hwy. 55 10-kilometres north of the same highway.


This stretch of road, Cyr said, usually sees bumper-to-bumper traffic throughout the day.


“When we’re looking at our area, we have a large volume of traffic on these specific highways. The fact that we haven’t had any funding for northeastern Alberta is problematic. Especially when you start looking at the fact that Hwy. 55, west of Cold Lake, has a great deal of traffic,” he explained. “It’s important that we look at these highways because they have just been forgotten.”


Getting these projects on the province’s list of things to do wasn’t easy.


According to Cyr, “a lot of it comes down to reaching out to our ministry.”


Cyr’s office contacts local municipalities, including First Nation and Métis Settlements, about which highways and bridges need to be addressed.


But it’s not only local officials who get to have a say.


“What happens is our local residents write into my office as well, and we send that directly to the minister’s office,” Cyr expressed.


Getting the areas to the design phase is half of the battle.


“I’m glad to see that we’re in the design phase, but the hard part is actually getting shovels into the ground. It’s good to see that the government is looking into designs, but right now, we really need to just have them more or less reviewing the areas, and creating a design,” noted Cyr.


Now, the projects have to make the province’s funded list.


Brian Mason, minister of transportation, said in a release, “We’re continuing to make significant investments in the transportation needs of this province. Our goal is to ensure Albertans are able to get from one place to another in a safe and efficient way. Through this construction season, I ask motorists for their understating and patience if there are inconveniences in their travels.”


Sawchuk described the province’s 2018 priorities as a “good start.”


He said, “There’s a ton of work to be done still. This area has seen an awful lot of traffic over the last few years. If you look at the state of Hwy. 28, it’s rough. We have to continue to advocate for more work to be done here.”

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