Rainy weather and extra paving have pushed crews working on the Selma Park section of Highway 101 past their deadline of May 31.
"We added about another, I would say, 100 metres of paving. Originally we weren't going to pave that northbound lane the full distance, but the pavement was such that it made sense to replace it at this time," said project manager Jay Porter in an interview with Coast Reporter Monday, June 6. "And then of course with weather and that, you can only pave in dry weather, that's why they'll be doing the top lift today [June 6] and the day after, and that should be it for the paving."
The paving shut down the northbound lane to traffic and caused waits of up to one hour to get through the Selma Park section of highway on Monday morning.
"Paving causes delays because you've got to pave through the intersections," he said. "That's where the big problems are. It causes the detours not to work as effectively. So once you're through that area, it should go a lot better as far as the traffic goes. They're trying the best they can. I've kept in touch with [the workers] and with Don Legault, the area manager there, just trying to make sure they're trying the best they can to keep that traffic moving."
When asked why the work wasn't scheduled at night to avoid lengthy traffic delays, Porter said, "It's a trade off."
"We have to get approval from the District of Sechelt to do that. It is noisy work, so if you're doing it at night, just because there's so much residential there, I guess it's a trade off. You deal with the traffic during the daytime or you deal with residents being awake at all hours of the night," Porter said.
Once the paving is finished, Porter said there is some final pavement marking to be done and he expects crews to be finished in the area "sometime next week."
