Last fall, the Town of Innisfil awarded a contract for road rehabilitation and ‘selective resurfacing’ to Forest Contractors Ltd., low bidder with a tender bid of just under $1.672 million.
The work was to include partial milling and repaving of Grand Vista Court, Isabella Street from Ewart Street to Whisker Ave., Cumberland Street, and Line 7 from County Rd. 27 to 5 Sideroad; and selective resurfacing and patching of portions of Line 6, Line 9, and the 7th Line from 20 Sideroad to Lake Simcoe.
The selective work on Line 7 was described as a ‘holding’ measure, to address the extremely poor condition of the road until road reconstruction begins.
There were already plans to widen and rebuild the 7th Line, beginning in 2021. A Class Environmental Assessment had been completed, and the road-widening was in the design phase, when town council endorsed plans for the Orbit, a ‘Smart Community.’ .
Concerns over additional traffic sent the design back to the drawing board for further traffic modelling and analysis.
As a result, selective patching will now be carried out not only on Line 7 between 20SR and the lake, but between 20 SR and Yonge Street. The added cost will be covered in the road rehabilitation budget.
The information was presented in the online meeting of council on May 27.
Coun. Donna Orsatti wanted to know if there was a new timeline for completion of the modelling and reconstruction of the 7th Line..
“There are a lot of complex things to be taken into account,” said Jessica Jenkins, Capital Engineering Leader. She noted it could take 12 to 18 months to complete the modelling of the impact of The Orbit planned settlement, followed by any needed redesign of the plans.
Orsatti also asked about the nature and durability of the ‘selective patching.’
Jenkins was quick to explain that it is “not just cold-patching. This scope of work is going to include cutting and digging out significant areas of asphalt and even gravel.”
The replacement and repaving “will hold for a couple of years,” she said. “It won’t be the whole width of the road that will be repaired… We’re focusing on the worst areas.”
Mayor Lynn Dollin noted that residents using the deteriorating 7th Line have been waiting for reconstruction to begin. She wanted the message to get out that the patching is not a final solution, but “a stop-gap to keep the road passable until the widening” can go ahead.
The road rehabilitation work was to begin in the fall of 2019, but as a staff report noted, “Early onset of winter weather conditions resulted in the town and contractor mutually agreeing to shift the construction works to Spring 2020.”
