LAC LA BICHE - "It's worse than it ever was before," is how Lac La Biche County Ward 1 councillor Darlene Beniuk, bluntly bridged the gap between the start and finish of a bridge construction project over the Christy Creek.
The bridge-fix affected traffic on the Christy Creek Road — township road 653 — for the summer, fall and winter seasons of 2020 as contracted crews worked to replace the aging bridge crossing the Beaver River about 20 kilometres south of the Lac La Biche hamlet. The east-west municipal roadway links Highway 663 to Highway 36.The work was said to be completed earlier this year, including the repaving of the approach section around the bridge.
Since the work has been completed on the bridge, however, Beniuk says reduced speed limit signs near the area, and complaints from area residents about vehicle-jarring bumps on both ends of the new bridge, have her trying to smooth out troubled waters.
"Is the original construction company responsible for fixing that, so people can keep their wheels on?" Beniuk has asked municipal public works boss Brian Shapka at council's most recent public meeting.
Fixes will happen
Shapka, the associate CAO of Infrastructure Services said the construction work and materials are still under full warranty and the firm responsible for the fix has committed to making the necessary repairs.
Explaining that the likely reason for the big road bumps is the settling of the fill material used at both ends of the bridge structure, Shapka said the construction crew will be back in the spring to fix it.
"They will be back to mill or fill in the asphalt. They will repair it," he said.
In October of 2019, Lac La Biche County councillors agreed to award the construction firm $841,860 for the project. An additional $56,102 was added to the project, transferred from surplus funding from the Plamondon-Caslan Connector project. Provincial government infrastructure funding allocations indicate that a 2019 grant for $747,750 was issued to Lac La County for the bridge replacement project.
