At long last, construction work to expand the southwest portion of Anthony Henday Drive is wrapping up, however some speed restrictions won’t be lifted until next spring.
In recent weeks, work has appeared to be winding down at the bridge over the North Saskatchewan River, where railings were recently installed and the extra lane open in each direction.
“All three lanes in each direction are open,” Transportation and Economic Corridors Minister Devin Dreeshen said Friday.
“However, by the bridge over the North Saskatchewan, there’s still going to be some non-major construction work that will last probably until the spring.”
As a result, the speed limit for the southwest bridges will remain 80 km/h through the winter, but the rest of the road is back up to the full 100 km/h speed limit.
Dreeshen said the bridges should be back to the full speed limit in the spring.
Since 2019, drivers have endured extensive construction on the 18-kilometre stretch between Calgary Trail and Whitemud Drive in the west end, as it was expanded from two to three lanes in each direction, for a total of six lanes of traffic.
The expanded freeway is expected to cut down on people’s commutes by an average of 15 minutes, the minister said, as well as improve the flow of commercial traffic like semi trucks.
“So a huge commitment by the provincial government to help out Edmontonians, not only to be able to get to work and back home in good time, but also to help the flow of goods and truck traffic going up to the Yellowhead from Highway 2.”
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Widening each bridge deck over the North Saskatchewan River was part of the project, and it fell a year behind schedule.
“This project was supposed to be done in three years. It took four years to get done,” Dreeshen said.
The delay was due to a mix of factors, he said: supply chain disruptions caused by the COVID-19 pandemic, staffing shortages and weather. Expanding an existing bridge while maintaining traffic flow added complexity as well but it wasn’t out of the norm.
“The typical type of of construction pressures that anyone would have in building a project like this,” Dreeshen said.
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The expansion budget came in at $100 million and Dreeshen said that price remains unchanged.
“With a $100-million price tag, I think it will go a long way to help out a lot of people in in that area.”
The entire initial two-lane ring road took 26 years to build, and as it grew, so too did the surrounding neighbourhoods.
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The Henday was originally designed to meet traffic capacity requirements through 2020 with a plan to accommodate up to 40,000 vehicles per day.
That initial capacity in southwest Edmonton was surpassed over a decade early in 2009 and by 2020, traffic volumes averaged 80,000 vehicles per day – twice what was predicted.
Adding an extra lane in each direction is expected to accommodate up to 120,000 vehicles per day.
“It wasn’t supposed to need this type of expansion this quickly, but we were happy to see it finally built,” Dreeshen said. “Lots of room to grow now in the southwest part of Edmonton.”
Unlike the rest of the ring road that’s paved with asphalt, the southwest segment – which was the first corner to be built — was finished with a concrete surface. Dreeshen said it was a test idea to see how new materials would fare in Alberta’s climate.
“Would this makes sense in the long term to be able to have less repaving of it and to have the structure last longer?”
He said sometimes those tests work our fantastic and other times they don’t.
“We have, obviously, very unique and difficult weather challenges up here in Edmonton, in Alberta, that I think is unique for most of the population that lives a lot closer to the equator and doesn’t have the -40s and the plus 40s that we do.”
The minister said he encourages his department to continue to look at different ways to building roads and using new materials, but said in this case, asphalt was the better choice for the remainder of the road.
“Asphalt just for the cheapness, the quick, easy overlay, the roughness index that is out there. When cracks form, it’s a lot easier to repair with asphalt. There’s a lot of extra added benefits for sure, especially with our freeze-thaw cycles.”
While the Henday runs through Edmonton, it is owned by the Alberta government so the two levels of government need to work together on projects like the Terwillegar Drive expansion, which has been happening at the same time as the freeway work.
The southwest Henday work is now complete but people in the Terwillegar and Windermere areas will continue to live with major construction in the coming years as the city gets to widening Terwillegar Drive to four lanes in both directions across Anthony Henday Drive to Windermere Boulevard, as well as building a second overpass over the freeway.
On Friday, Dreeshen said the province is still in talks with the city on that work so it’s not yet known how that work will affect traffic.
— More to come…
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