Kingston’s 3rd crossing still has plenty of work ahead

Getting money for a $180-million bridge is only half the battle. Now comes the complex job of building Kingston’s third crossing.

It’s a three-year project that’s expected to start next year. It’ll span one kilometre over the Rideau Canal on the Cataraqui River, a UNESCO World Heritage Site.

Mark Van Buren is the city’s Transport and Infrastructure commissioner. He says the hunt is now on for a project management team that will help keep the third bridge crossing on time and on budget.

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“That will be a team that’s going to have to look at a number of the different aspects of the project. Trying to optimize some of the sub-structure components for the bridge, foundation arrangements, the connecting road requirements, an awful lot of the technical details that’s going to be needed before we get into the final construction phase.”

Tweet This Click to share quote on Twitter: "That will be a team that's going to have to look at a number of the different aspects of the project. Trying to optimize some of the sub-structure components for the bridge, foundation arrangements, the connecting road requirements, an awful lot of the technical details that's going to be needed before we get into the final construction phase."

Not everyone is pleased with the final piece in the funding puzzle. Duncan McDowall is with the group “No Third Crossing.” He lives in Pittsburgh District on the east side of the river.

“The bridge represents, we think, a surrender to the car culture yet again in Kingston. Kingston’s one of the most geographically dispersed small cities in the country. We have well above-average SO2 emissions and the bridge will simply exacerbate that, at a time when the rest of the nation is turning its attention to green infrastructure, rapid transit.”

Tweet This Click to share quote on Twitter: "The bridge represents, we think, a surrender to the car culture yet again in Kingston. Kingston's one of the most geographically dispersed small cities in the country. We have well above-average SO2 emissions and the bridge will simply exacerbate that, at a time when the rest of the nation is turning its attention to green infrastructure, rapid transit."

Van Buren says the goal is to have shovels in the ground by mid-2019.