Rendering of future Cache Creek bridge (Image Credit: BC Ministry of Transportation and Infrastructure)

By Sydney Chisholm

Cache Creek Bridge

New Cache Creek bridge project on its way

Oct 5, 2023 | 12:00 PM

CACHE CREEK, B.C. — Cache Creek will soon have a new bridge on Highway 97 after spring floods wiped out much of the highway earlier this year.

The Ministry of Transportation and Infrastructure held an information session on Wednesday evening (Oct. 4) to provide the community with information on the project slated to get underway this fall.

“There’s been floods in five of the last eight years and I think the community is tired of seeing the amount of flooding that happens in Cache Creek,” Cache Creek Mayor John Ranta told CFJC News. “Certainly having a bridge across Highway 97 will help to resolve that issue.”

Earlier this year spring runoff water caused Cache Creek to spill over the Highway 97 crossing, causing extensive damage to infrastructure within the village.

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Flooding has become a near-annual occurrence in Cache Creek, and while prevention plans have been in the works for some time, it wasn’t until this year’s flooding that a plan started to solidify.

“We’ve been studying this project for the past year and a half or so,” John Babineau, the project director says. “After the flooding that occurred in spring of 2023, [we] really went on an accelerated schedule.”

According to the Ministry of Transportation, the new passing is expected to be 13 metres long, four lanes wide and will be better able to withstand floodwater.

A budget for the project is yet to be announced as it will go to tender this fall.

Construction is slated to begin in the winter with a completion date for the end of 2024.