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Big dig planned at Queen and East

Sewers deep underneath East Street are in bad shape. The city wants to replace them during next year's resurfacing of Queen Street
Queen and East 2022
City officials are promising to maintain access to all businesses next year when they dig deep to fix infrastructure problems beneath this Queen/East intersection

As the city prepares to resurface downtown Queen Street starting in 2023, business leaders and city officials are bracing for disruptions.

Although final decisions will be made by City Council, information surfacing at recent civic meetings suggests the project is likely to take more than one year, and commercial establishments near the intersection of Queen and East streets are likely to be hardest hit.

Next year's project is a 'resurfacing.'

Unlike the deep excavations done on Queen Street in 1980-1981, the 2023 work involves replacing road asphalt and repairing surface-level stuff like curbs and sidewalks.

But the intersection with East Street will be an exception to that rule.

The underground sewers there are in bad shape and need to be replaced.

It would make no sense to resurface Queen Street next year and then tear it up later to fix the sewers.

"The city anticipates reconstruction of East Street, including the replacement of the underground infrastructure, will be required in the near future," says municipal services engineer Maggie McAuley.

"A section of East Street reconstruction was combined with Queen Street resurfacing project so that the intersection is only reconstructed once," McAuley says.

Don McConnell, the city's director of planning, retired this week after a 44-year career with the City of Sault Ste. Marie.

He was talking about the project during last month's meeting of the Downtown Association.

"East Street needs a total rebuild, including the sewers," McConnell said.

"In the sewer business you have to start at the end and work back. As part of this, at the same time as this, we will do Bay Street up through and clean the intersection into Queen."

The job will be big and expensive, but McConnell promised: "We will maintain access to all businesses at all times. That's the game plan."

No decision has been made yet, but McConnell said the Queen Street resurfacing will probably be done over two construction seasons, with Spring Street the dividing point.

"It's a big project," he told Downtown Association board members. 

"This is going to be a disruption to the businesses. I'm not hiding that."

"We will do everything possible. We intend to maintain access to all businesses at all times."

"The project will likely be divided into two parts, simply because of the scale."

McConnell said Pim to Spring will likely be done next year, with everything beyond that left for the 2024 construction season.

Aside from replacing the road surface, McConnell says the city's trying to improve the downtown aesthetics. 

The new streetscape has been designed to provide patio space in front of every restaurant, whether they want one or not.

Longstanding complaints about core-area parking are now receiving serious attention.

Some blocks currently have no on-street parking.

The proposed design offers some parking on every block, on both sides of Queen Street,

Some new parking spots have been created by shortening excessively long turning lanes.

"It's not warranted under the traffic counts to have giant long turning lanes for people to turn up Bruce Street or Dennis Street or East Street," McConnell said.

"That gives us more space for both landscaping and parking."

The city is also looking at narrowing intersections, to allow extended sidewalk areas and shorter crossing distances for pedestrians at intersections.

"This is our chance to get this right. It's going to be here for the next 40 years," McConnell says.

At 716 Queen St. E., Camera Craft is unhappy with the parking it's been allotted in the new plan.

"Camera Craft has been in business on Queen Street for 60-plus years," the business says in a letter to City Council.

"Our family has been the proud caretakers for 25 years and we’ve faced many issues with parking (and the lack thereof) since taking over the business."

"There are currently nine parking spots on the north side of Queen from Hynes Street to East Street and seven parking spots from the driveway at the BDO building to East Street."

"The current proposal for the refurbishing of Queen St will be removing seven of these spots with no provision to replace them leaving nine spots for over one dozen businesses to share."

At the Downtown Association, board member Nicholas Rosset says communication will be key to a successful downtown resurfacing project.

"Let's keep our members abreast of everything that's happening with this. I'll tell you right now, everybody hates disruptions in their businesses."

"You have to get prepared for downtime. You will have downtime," Rosset says.


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David Helwig

About the Author: David Helwig

David Helwig's journalism career spans seven decades beginning in the 1960s. His work has been recognized with national and international awards.
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