Repair work on a section of Marine Avenue, which is part of Highway 101 that runs through the qathet region, will take place on January 13 and 14.
Rino Parise, area manager for the provincial ministry of transportation and infrastructure, said the damage to the road along Marine Avenue in City of Powell River is due to frost heaves.
“It’s not usual that we get frost heaving here,” said Parise. “It’s the thaw and then freeze, thaw and then freeze again. It happens a lot up north, it doesn’t happen here.
“The weakest points of the roads really show themselves under those conditions and that’s what we’ve got down on Marine Avenue.”
Parise said the good news is that on Thursday and Friday, repairs will be conducted. Motorists using that stretch of road can expect delays between Duncan and Burnaby streets in both directions between 7 am and 5 pm.
“Expect delays or use an alternate route,” said Parise. “I’ve already talked to RE/MAX and the medical centre [Marine Medical Clinic], so the real estate agents should probably just work from home or go around the back.
“We’ve got to fix it up. The worst locations are going to be great big patches. I think there are four or five altogether.”
Parise said his maintenance contractor is Capilano Highway Services, who will be working in conjunction with BA Blacktop to make the repairs.
“They have a plan in place,” said Parise. “We have to dig it all up and put in a proper sub-base. It’s going to take a bit of time, so that’s why it’s going to take a couple of days to make the repairs.”
Parise said the best bet for motorists is to take an alternative route on those two days.
“There’s lots of other routes around,” said Parise. “If people don’t need to go to those places on Marine Avenue, they might as well go around. However, there will be flag people at the repair sites if people need to go down to Marine.”
Parise said the Marine Avenue corridor is the major repair that needs to be done. He said that for the most part, the rest of the highway system is functioning well.
