Construction to rebuild the portion of the Trans-Canada Highway which was washed out in the June 18 flood should begin this month.
Rebuilding of the washed-out westbound lanes will see one new arch culvert installed that’s capable of handling a greater volume of water than the original two round culverts.
Before the highway washed out, there were two round culverts under the road surface of the westbound lanes. Each of these two culverts were 3.6 metres in diameter. These two culverts were capable of handling a one in 240-year flood event.
During the rebuilding of the westbound lanes, a single arch culvert that’s 11.8 metres wide and 4.8 metres high will be installed. It will be capable of handling approximately a one in 1,200-year flood event. This work is expected to be completed by late fall and will re-establish four-lane service for the winter.
The arch culvert will be extended in 2011 during the rebuilding of the eastbound lanes. Traffic will be diverted to the westbound lanes in 2011 to operate as two lanes to facilitate reconstruction of the eastbound lanes.
Once all this work is completed in 2011, it is expected that the new arch culvert will prevent water from overtopping the highway and that all four lanes on this portion of the Trans-Canada would remain open to traffic if the same type of flooding as in June 2010 was repeated.
The Ministry of Highways and Infrastructure expected to have a contractor secured for the arch culvert work by late August and a second contractor for the earth work and paving secured in early September.
“Highway 1 is a major transportation artery connecting Saskatchewan’s export-based economy to local, provincial, national and worldwide markets,” Highways and Infrastructure Minister Jim Reiter said. “Keeping the Trans-Canada open for traffic has been one of our top priorities, since it’s critical to the safe and efficient movement of goods and services that the province depends on.”
Restoration of two-lane service in the eastbound lanes was completed and opened to traffic on June 26. New crossovers opened to traffic on July 15 to allow for a smoother and easier transition for motorists, along with improved movement of various semi truck and trailer combinations from four lanes to two lanes.
“These measures restored service in about a week and were done as quickly and as safely as possible in the short term,” Reiter said. “We’re now moving into the next phase that will result in long-term repairs. Designs for these long-term repairs began immediately and were recently completed; typically, for such a project, it would take as much as a year to complete a design. The Ministry accelerated this design work due to the emergency circumstances, but kept an eye on ensuring we got the plan right.”