By Chonglu Huang
The reconstruction of Bank Street may be smoother and speedier thanks to the cancellation of Ottawa’s light rail transit project.
Some sections may even finish a few years ahead of schedule, says project manager Richard Holder.
“Now that the LRT project is cancelled, we’re looking to move forward with the design of Bank Street between Laurier and the Queensway this year and [begin] construction between Laurier and Somerset in 2008,” says Holder.
Initially, construction from Laurier to Somerset would have had to wait until as late as 2010 due to the excavation of Slater and Albert for the LRT, he says.
But with the LRT out of the picture, the plan to skip the section from Laurier to Somerset and begin work on the section from the Queensway to Lansdowne Park in 2008 is now no longer being considered.
The Bank Street Promenade Business Improvement Area — representing Wellington to Gladstone — pushed for chronological rehabilitation phasing, one that starts at Wellington and ends at Lansdowne Park, says Gerry Lepage, executive director of the BIA.
“We were under the impression that the revitalization would be concurrent year after year,” added Lepage. “There hasn’t been an instant in Ottawa where they had handled revitalization in a BIA where it would be fragmented — do a little piece, go away, come back four, five years later. That’s just not consistent with the way the city phases this construction.”
Lepage says the BIA sees the LRT’s cancellation as positive for Bank Street rehabilitation.
“We support public transit absolutely, but we didn’t support the LRT in this configuration,” he says, adding that the train would have torn up the corridors of Albert and Slater, and would have been extremely intrusive to the business area.
Although the street reconstruction has been just as intrusive, it is very necessary.
“When you have sewer and water [infrastructure] that is between 50 to 100 years old, it’s going to limit capacity and that has to be changed,” says Lepage.
Businesses will be appreciative when the street is done and its looks have improved, he added.
The section from Wellington to Laurier – which experienced major underground reconstruction in late 2006 – still needs some work done on its curbs and buildings next spring.
Lepage says there was considerable disruption and money lost for retail stores during the three months that section was encaged and blocked-off.
But for some fast food businesses, the impact was minimal.
“We deal mostly with businesses around here for lunch time and they still come out here regardless of the construction,” says Oliver Kretzmer, an employee at Extreme Pita, located on the corner of Bank and Albert.
Even though some sections of Bank Street may finish early due to the LRT cancellation, the overall rehabilitation project would still not be completed until 2010-11 or later.
Somerset Coun. Diane Holmes, says it all comes down to money.
The proposed cost of the total reconstruction project is currently estimated at $50 million, she says.
The city has yet to approve this amount in the 2007 budget, to be released at the end of February.
Holmes says businesses also have a say in how long the rehabilitation might last.
“Sometimes they vote to close the whole street and have the construction done more quickly and sometimes, they vote to keep a lane or two open and in that case the construction goes a little more slowly,” she says.