WESTLOCK – The Town of Westlock’s new $4.44-million public works shop and cold-storage facility are on track to be open this year, while road construction crews are expected to start work in June on the remainder of the massive $7.3-million 108th Street reconstruction project that first began in 2021.
And in a May 24 interview, CAO Simone Wiley said she’s also currently working on a plan to clean up the old site of Jubilee Arena, which finally met with the wrecking ball earlier this year — the total budget for the demo and site reclamation is set at $600,000, with $169,686.12 spent in 2022. Although she didn’t have a firm date for that work, the intent is to start in the summer and have it done by September.
“I’m working on a bit of a site plan for it just in terms of where we want to put some power pedestals and making sure we have the correct lighting just to do a little bit of a parking design so that that area can be used for things like the ag fair and for food trucks and things like that. We want to make it a multi-purpose parking area,” she said.
Meanwhile, Wiley said the new public works shop is on schedule for a late fall opening — with the frame and roof complete, crews are slated to pour the floor soon. In addition, the $320,000 cold-storage facility, which will be in the same vicinity, is slated to go up in “mid-to-late July.” First announced in December 2021 as part of the municipality’s 2022 capital budget, ground broke on the new shop last August.
The old shop was built in 1975 and named after David G. Turner, a long-time town employee and community booster. That facility underwent an engineering review in 2017 which led to some fixes the following year, while a past briefing to town council noted it required “substantial” repairs to remain in use and is too small for “current operational needs.”
“The shop should be open by the end of November, so timing is going to be a little tight to have it done before Christmas,” said Wiley.
Finally, Wiley said crews will start underground work on the eastern portion of 108th Street the second week of June, while paving of the remainder of the stretch is slated to be done by the end of September. At their May 8 meeting, Town of Westlock councillors unanimously voted 6-0 (mayor Ralph Leriger was absent) to amend the municipality’s 2023-2024 capital budget for DPC30-10 Infrastructure Rehab Program 108th Street from $1,485,000 to $1,870,000 — the project will be funded via reserves, “contributions” and the Canadian Communities Building Fund Grant.
The project originally started April 6, 2021, and was to include a fresh asphalt overlay, new curbs, gutters, and sidewalks, as well as a new storm sewer line, sanitary sewer line and sanitary water line for the entire stretch but quickly ground to a halt following the discovery of “heavy concentrations of hydrocarbons” from a long-since shuttered Imperial Oil fuel site. That year crews got about 80 per cent of the road done, while the project was shelved in 2022 as the town and Imperial Oil continued negotiations on the clean-up bill.
