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PAVING OF SUBDIVISION ROADS
The
Aid to Municipality Cost-Share Paving Program has
been given a big boost to help address the backlog
of gravelled streets waiting for paving. The
Provincial Government has made a significant
contribution that will bring about some paving to
the subdivision streets in the Lawrencetown area.
This year, $800,000 has been committed to paving
some of those residential roads. This will give
leverage at least $1.6 Million in local street
improvements. It is anticipated an estimate of 5
Km's of roadways will be paved this year because of
this funding enhancement. There are 35 public 'J'
Class residential gravelled streets in the
Lawrencetown area with a collective distance of
approximately 19.5 kilometres. 27 of these streets
are currently on the HRM 'Petitioned Priority List'
seeking upgrading. As for the other 8 un-petitioned
streets, I will requesting that HRM exercise its
authority under the Municipal Government Act to
waive the right of petition and include them in any
future road improvements. HRM officials have
calculated a total estimate of $6.4 million that
would be done on a 50%-50% cost-share basis between
the Province and the landowners of the abutting 600
properties that have assessable frontages along
these affected streets. Therefore, the provincial
share should only be $3.2 million. HRM is expected
to sign an agreement shortly with the Province and
the tenders will be called for paving work to be
completed by this Autumn 2006. These roadways are
generally and geographically clumped close together
in or near three major subdivisions. Practically all
the streets are interconnected to one another.
Therefore HRM is investigating the possibility of
taking a more concerted and consolidated approach
that will help formulate and facilitate a
bulk-tender proposal. This way ought to be more
effective in addressing those problematic areas all
at once instead of the haphazard method of paving
sporadically according to an outdated petition list.
Doing it by the old traditional methods and routine
procurement procedures will not be beneficial nor
practical in this circumstance. Paving only a couple
of streets at a time will not yield the potential
for accrued benefits and it will also take several
more years to complete the entire area. There is an
opportunity here to achieve great efficiencies and
bulk discounts because the costs usually associated
with the mobilization of heavy equipment and the
hauling of asphalt can be kept to a minimum, as
compared to past conventional paving work. This
proposal of a bulk-paving package should generate
enormous economies-of-scale and realize significant
savings to the taxpayers. Hopefully, the total cost
should come in sufficiently lower than originally
estimated. These results ought to be realized once
the tenders have been received.
The Eastern Shore MLA, Hon. Bill
Dooks and I have been working collaboratively to
develop this more aggressive systematic approach. We
would like to thank all those residents that have
filled out the local street survey. It certainly
helped with this initiative. This partnership of HRM
with the Province will enable us both to
strategically tackle and expedite these much needed
improvements to our local infrastructure. The long
wait for Lawrencetown and other areas is finally
over. |
