WATCH: Work is now underway to install a huge sewage pipe along Dallas Road, which will connect to Victoria’s controversial new sewage treatment plant. Tess van Straaten has the latest.
Crews are hard at work – digging a trench along Dallas Road where a massive new sewage pipe will go.
“It’s good, I’m feeling good, the project is moving along,” says Victoria mayor and former sewage committee chair Lisa Helps. “It’s good to see progress being made.”
The pipe, called the Clover Forcemain, will carry wastewater from Clover Point to Ogden Point, where it will connect to a cross-harbour undersea pipe running to the new McLoughlin Point Wastewater Treatment Plant.
It’s part of a $765 million infrastructure project to bring tertiary sewage treatment to Greater Victoria. But installation of the pipe will lead to some major disruptions.
“It’s going to be very disruptive for the next little while but we’re going to ask for residents’ patience because this is something I think that’s been a priority in our region for a long time,” says Helps.
Digging a trench for such a big a pipe and laying it in the ground is no easy feat and that’s why construction is expected to stretch through both the spring and summer.
To minimize the impact on traffic and residents, the pipe will be installed in sections. Work is now underway from Niagara Street to Dock Street and Clover Point to Cook Street.
Work will then continue towards Government Street, with the sections from Government to Cook slated for the summer.
During construction, the Capital Regional District (CRD) says there will be single lane, alternating traffic as well as temporary road closures and parking impacts.
The James Bay Neighbourhood Association says its most concerned about disruptive blasting between Montreal and Dock Streets.
But according to a construction bulletin, the CRD expects that will be done around mid-January.
As for the total project, the largest infrastructure project in Greater Victoria history, officials say it’s still on time and on budget despite a highly competitive construction market and the Grange Road tree issue.
“I hesitate to use the words ‘on time and on budget’ because of the Blue Bridge, because that was supposed to be on time and on budget and look what happened, but I have so much confidence in the team running this project and it’s on schedule and they’re telling us they can bring it in on budget.”
The treatment plant will be up and running by November 2020.
Tess van Straaten
