A 10-hour closure is coming to Hwy. 4.
B.C.’s ministry of transportation and infrastructure has announced the only road connecting the Tofino-Ucluelet region to the rest of Vancouver Island will be shut down in both directions from 8 a.m. to 6 p.m. on Tuesday, March 23.
The ministry says the closure is needed to remove a large rock bluff as part of the provincial and federal government’s $38 million Kennedy Hill Improvement project.
“This 10-hour closure is required for crews to undertake one of the most complex blasts on the project. The daylight closure will allow workers time to prepare the road beneath the blast area, and to safely remove loose rock immediately following the blast,” the announcement reads.
Work on the project, which is focused on upgrading a roughly 1.5-kilometre stretch of highway near Kennedy Lake, began in 2018, bringing daily closures to West Coast commuters. The project was initially expected to be complete by the summer of 2020 but has since blown past that timeline. A concrete completion date has not yet been announced.
READ MORE: Highway closures hit travellers heading in and out of Tofino and Ucluelet
The current closure schedule, which includes four-hour closures from 11 a.m. to 3 p.m. each weekday, is expected to resume on Wednesday, March 24, according to the ministry.
The Highway 4 Kennedy Hill Safety Improvement Project closure schedule is attached for the period of February 22 to…
Posted by EAC Hwy 4 Kennedy Hill Project Updates on Monday, February 22, 2021
“When completed, the Highway 4–Kennedy Hill Safety Improvement Project will create a safer, more reliable connection between Port Alberni and the west coast of Vancouver Island,” the announcement reads. “The ministry thanks motorists and residents on both sides of the closure for their patience.”
Ucluelet mayor Mayco Noel told the Westerly News that removing the large rock bluff could catapult the project forward.
“There’s one nasty, big rock in question that these guys need to overcome and once they overcome this, it is going to be easy street,” he said. “I’ve been led to believe that there will be the possibility of less closures here if they can get around this obstacle…This is something to celebrate. If they can get this hazard dealt with, it’s going to be a good thing for the West Coast. It makes us get a little bit closer to the finish line.”
Noel said he is confident the rock will be removed within the scheduled 10-hour time-frame and suggested the oft-maligned mishaps that have occurred during the past several years of construction have brought valuable insight about the terrain.
“A couple things went sideways and I know that the contractor and the ministry have had some serious lessons learned,” he said. “There’s no disputing that the ministry and the current contractor there understands how the West Coast feels when they don’t adhere to times…There’s been a huge amount of movement done. I know it’s been over a long period of time for us West Coasters, but they have this big rock they need to get over and it’s been expressed to me that they are very confident that they’ll be able to get the work they need to get done.”
READ MORE: Rock blasting along Tofino-Ucluelet highway put on hiatus
He added that once the Kennedy Hill project is complete, further roadwork will still be needed to bring the rest of the highway up to an acceptable safety standard.
“It won’t be to this extent of disruption, but for the foreseeable future there are going to be sections that need to be addressed so that the over-a-million travelling motorists have a bit of a safer, smoother road to travel on,” he said. “Until there is a motivation to actually deal with 20-30 kilometres that will serve the West Coast residents for 100 years, we’ll just continue to get piecemealed and this is what we end up with: two or three kilometres get repaired every year and, at the end of the day, it does get tiresome for everybody.”
Concerns have been raised around how the March 23 closure could impact a COVID-19 vaccine clinic for seniors in Ucluelet scheduled for March 24, but Noel assured multiple agencies are having “conversations in the background” to ensure that clinic goes as planned.
andrew.bailey@westerlynews.caLike us on Facebook and follow us on Twitter
READ MORE: Survey swirls up confusion around Tofino-Ucluelet highway closures
READ MORE: Tofino-Ucluelet highway project budget and timeline under review
