(Phase 1 of West Victoria Street Improvement Project)

By Dylana Milobar

WEST VICTORIA STREET IMPROVEMENT PROJECT

So far, so good; West Victoria Street construction ahead of schedule

Jul 26, 2019 | 4:58 PM

KAMLOOPS — It was originally thought that the overhaul of West Victoria Street in downtown Kamloops was going to take around 18 months to two years for all the phases to be completed.

However, construction has been streamlined to the point where asphalt paving is expected to be done before winter of this year.

City of Kamloops CAO David Trawin says relatively smooth construction, and Extreme Excavating doubling up shifts means the Victoria Street West Improvements Project is now ahead of schedule.

“The result of that is, we feel, and the contractor feels, barring any unforseen circumstances, that they will have asphalt down before the snow falls this year.”

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(West Victoria Street Improvement Project)

Along with sped-up construction, Trawin says there haven’t been cost spikes in the $13 million project budget so far.

“There’s lots of partners involved in this. CP, BCLC, Hydro — so we’re waiting to see how those numbers come in on,” he explains. “As of now, we feel we’re fairly close.”

Non-modern human remains were found a few weeks ago while digging into the street. However, Extreme Excavating’s Project Manager, Alistair Elliot, says construction crews weren’t delayed by the discovery, as City and Tk’emlups employees worked quickly to recover the remains.

“We were actually expecting more, given the history — with this being Chinatown and all that,” Elliot says, “but I think it’s been dug through so many times that honestly we haven’t found a lot of anything.”

This weekend, BC Housing will start installing the Canadian Mental Health Association Housing Project along the stretch. Given the space needed to crane in the modular units, work is scheduled for evenings instead of daytime.

“So the roads will be shut down on some of those days at night, where there will be no traffic back and forth,” explains Trawin. “Obviously we want to make sure the businesses will be kept open. So we’ve said no, you (BC Housing) can’t do it during that time, and we want to make sure that traffic flows also.”

And as Phase 1 wraps up, drivers will see some changes made to the way they move through West Victoria Street in August.

Part of Seymour Street might still be closed, but the detour up 1st Avenue will change to have traffic coming to the North Shore from Lansdowne continue straight, as it was before construction.

(West Victoria Street Improvement Project)