...or has it?
The meeting is to take place on December 10th at 5pm, Simcoe Town Hall at 50 Colborne Street South. (It's a full docket so bring a comfy pillow.)
For those of you who are not up to date, please read on for a full account.
The road closure issue began when Wendy Cridland, Manager at The Nature Conservancy of Canada, requested of her husband, Bill Cridland, Norfolk County Roads Manager, to close the 4th Concession, as her organization owns most of the property bordering the road.
County staff approached one of the citizens whose property is also bordered by the 4th Concession, Mr. Kenline, to discuss the idea of gating the road. As Mr. Kenline has stated, he wanted time to think about the impact, and to speak to his neighbours about it. It has been reported that the other citizens who reside on this road were never contacted by the County. Further to this, County did not post a notice in the local paper, which is contrary to official procedure.
A Staff report was put together stating that the property owner was in full agreement to the closure and Council voted on the matter. According to the report, the road was being closed to prevent wild bush parties, illegal dumping, stolen cars ditched and burned and rutting of the road due to it's poor condition. (The truth of the matter is there never were stolen cars or wild bush parties on the 4th. Everyone in the area knows all the parties were held by the dirt 6th until that section was closed and yes, it there's a burnt vehicle in the County, it's done on the 6th as well.)
NCC paid to have gates installed and the public was denied access to the common road. The meeting in video can be found here.
The Nature Conservancy of Canada and Staff claimed that there would never again be a garbage issue on the 4th Concession. However, 6 Months after it was gated a couch and other garbage could still be found in the ditches and stream (see image below).
The road is nicely graded now and ruts are no longer a problem. Since the gates went up the graders have been down the road more than they ever have. One of the main problems with the ruts was neglect from the Road's Division leading up to the staff report and the make up of the road itself. Norfolk Clay is a tough challenge no doubt about it. Lucky for us we've also been blessed with Sand. Plains of it. The two work very well together if it's done right. Maybe they need to call in a Farmer.
To sway the opinion of County Council, Bill Cridland came up with some very high cost guesstimates to fulfill his wife's request. At $180 per lineal meter for gravel and needing the entire 2000M road resurfaced the guesstimate came in around $360,000. The bridge itself also needed work. It had been inspected in 2011 and was declared to need guardrails. Mr. Cridland also added a new deck to the works and the total cost of the Bridge repair came in at $100,000. This wasn't quite good enough so to bump up the cost into the ridiculous category, it was suggested that a 2 lane super structure bridge was needed. $350,000-$400,000 for the Kings Highway category bridge. If the folks reading this have never been to the Bridge, it's 24 feet long by 10 feet wide. A few roads south of this location a new culvert was put in on Highway 42. It's named the Tulpin Culvert and it's 130 feet long by 30 feet wide. The cost to do that complete job came in at $440,000. Even with that project being just completed a mere six months ago, it has a dip in the new asphalt that will test the shocks absorbers in your ride. Total cost to repair a 200 year old dirt road coming in at $760,000! Ludicrous you say? Keep reading.
Once the gates went up people that drove down the road previously started to wonder what happened. There are many Bridges in our area that get concrete blocks placed in front of them barring access. Even though they have been budgeted for repair the money finds it way to other areas of the County. Mostly Simcoe. Norfolk's a small enough area that people know their neighbours and soon everyone was talking about the Red Gate infection that we've had to endure in the last few years. Citizens finally had enough and a meeting was called to discuss the options. A solicitor was hired and the legal proceedings to quash the bylaw and have it repealed were set in motion. The common goal is to have the gates completely removed so all the public can enjoy access again. Nothing else will be satisfactory. The 2nd meeting can be found here : Part 1, Part 2.
Meeting two had it all. Tempers were running hot, the Solicitor was getting grilled about a flyer he knew nothing of and no pertinent questions were asked of him. The grilling continued even in the hallway after the meeting and the Mayor can be heard bragging about his petition signing prowess. A far cry from the professionalism that one would expect in Council chambers. The meeting ended with Council needing to get more information from their Solicitor regarding the matter. This information has been submitted to Council now. The Citizens reached out to Council to see if they would be able to meet individually about their concerns. Most of the Councilors agreed to this proposal.
Meeting 3 was originally scheduled for December 3rd. The Solicitor for the Citizen's group asked for a deferral until December 10th since he was away and it was granted. A last minute change was announced and the meeting ended up being moved ahead to November 26th. Since the Citizens were unable to have their legal representative there, they asked for a deferral until December 10th. This was granted and it was mentioned that County Staff should meet with the residents of the 4th Concession. Mr. Keith Robicheau, Mr. Eric D'Hondt and Mr. Bill Cridland from County Staff attended along with Ms. Betty Chanyi. It was at this meeting that Staff announced that a new bridge assessment has taken place and there are now structural issues affecting any potential reopening. The Bridge will now have to stay closed because of the state of disrepair. This solution still leaves the road closed and the highly inflated cost of the super structure bridge being proposed will definitively be an issue for Council to consider. So far the County has managed to close many of the Ward 1 bridges and have reallocated those repair funds into projects in another Ward.
The current report before Council can be found here. County Staff is recommending moving the gates. This decision is based around The Nature Conservancy of Canada's request to gate a public road. At what point does Staff take into consideration the fact that well over 150 people signed a petition stating they want the road open to the public? NCC claims to have 9 employees in Norfolk County. If another private landowner owns property on both sides of roads can they also approach the County and have a gate installed? If it's not well received, County Staff can also absorb the cost of the relocation? Surely County Council can see that a Bridge cost of $14,583 per lineal foot is not required on this particular road. If the County Road Department is unable to reduce that cost perhaps the Department itself needs to be looked at. With a deficit of $30,000,000 expected by the end of this year, it would appear that a more prudent and fiscally responsible Manager is needed. One willing to work with the tax paying Citizen's instead of buckling to his wife's demands.
There are numerous Bridges in Ward 1 in dire need of repair. All had been budgeted for repairs at some point in time but never carried out. If the County Engineering Firm is unable to come up with ideas to reduce the cost then perhaps that contract should be looked at as well. There must be a better way than building super structure bridges for back roads. These bridges were likely a reasonable cost when they first went into service and have served their purpose. What happened to common sense and cost control?
Does the public need to start obtaining their own quotations on projects to insure the prices are not inflated?
Let's find out. The meetings tomorrow. See you there!
No comments:
Post a Comment