Municipal staff are ensuring residents that they are listening to concerns about an upcoming construction project on a historic Chatham street.
Victoria Avenue from McNaughton Avenue to Thames Street is set to undergo a two-phase sewer replacement project starting in 2022. While the street is ripped up, municipal staff are recommending that the sidewalks be removed and replaced with multi-use pathways that are located next to the street.
However, the proposed project has drawn ire from some residents who fear it will add safety concerns to the street and diminish the neighbourhood's heritage.
Many residents worried that the project would require a number of mature trees to be cut down.
Chris Thibert, Chatham-Kent’s director of engineering and transportation, explained that for safety reasons, a third-party arborist was sent to the site to verify the status of all the trees located on municipal property.
"There were 19 trees that were identified in this report that were either diseased or dead or they have limbs that are concerning to us from a safety standpoint for pedestrians," said Thibert. "These 19 trees are completely independent of the project, they have nothing to do with the project."
According to Thibert, only three trees were identified that would need to be removed in order to accommodate the project.
A cross section showing Victoria Ave. currently (top), and the proposed changes (bottom).
"There's many variations of the project and different alternatives that we can consider," he said. "The one that was presented to the public only impacted three trees."
Many residents also said putting a multi-use path right next to the street has them concerned about the safety of pedestrians being too close to the roadway.
However, Thibert said the installation of the multi-use trail would come with traffic calming measures which would ensure safety.
"By making the multi-use trails and sidewalks up against the road wider, it gets the public further away from the road and with the slower speed of traffic, gives you that safety buffer that we're looking for," explained Thibert.
He is also trying to ease any fears that residents have about snowplows pushing snow onto the sidewalk if it was placed directly next to the road.
"The goal of the wider sidewalk and wider trail adjacent to the road...[is to] provide storage for snow removal and still have a means of an accessible pedestrian crossing in the actual trail itself," he explained.
Thibert stressed that there are other possibilities being considered and added the project presented to residents is still only in the proposal phase.
"The option that we chose and presented to the public was the one that had the least impact to the trees and to the heritage of the street, which is the ultimate goal of the project," Thibert said. Respectfully and understanding the amount of comments and feedback that we're receiving, there's definitely some opposition to what we showed. There are some options to consider different locations and a different strategic direction of this project."
Residents have until March 13, 2020 to submit their feedback on the project. Comments will then be reviewed from March 16-20, 2020.
Councillor Michael Bondy will put forward a motion on March 23, requesting that staff proceed with the project in a simpler form, only doing the necessary underground infrastructure work.
-With files from Paul Pedro, Cheryl Johnstone