In anticipation of the $217.75 million Cariboo Memorial Hospital expansion project planned for Williams Lake, an archaeological assessment is underway in the area.
Sugar Cane Archaeology has done some shovel testing over the last two weeks in the green space north of the main parking lot, around Deni House and the hospice and hostel building facing Fourth Avenue, said Williams Lake First Nation title and rights manager Whitney Spearing Monday as she was waiting for an excavator to arrive.
“We already put in a five-metre grid in the green spaces to look for archaeological material,” she said.
As of Monday morning, the northwest corner of the parking lot has been sectioned off covering about six parking spaces and the plan is to dig 34 trenches that are three-metres long by one-metre wide each.
“In the assessment done by hand we found some natural soil, but under the parking lot we will see if there is anything left. There’s definitely a lot of garbage in the upper layer.”
B.C.’s minister of health Adrian Dix announced in April that Graham Design Builders LP of Delta was selected as the project proponent.
Read more: B.C. company chosen for $217.8 million hospital redevelopment in Williams Lake
The final design should be completed by the fall of 2021 and ground-breaking in the first half of 2022.
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