Quesnel City Council has approved in principle the suggested design of the revitalization of Reid Street.
The cost is estimated at just over 6.1 million dollars, which includes a contingency of more than 700 thousand dollars, and gives staff the green light to go out into the market to get specific costs.
The goal is to tender the project in February.
Some of the streetscaping that was unveiled last night included things like lamps, benches, trees, a gateway feature and drop off areas to name just a few.
The vote was not unanimous however, as Councillors Ron Paull and Shushil Thapar both remain opposed…
“I have no issue with the price or the work going into this street. I am not comfortable with the single lane and that is my issue, but other than that the project is needed.”
Reid Street will remain one way with parking on both sides, but will go down to one lane from two.
The one lane however is much wider, about 6 1/2 meters, than the normal city street which is 3.6 meters.
The project is only for the first three blocks of Reid Street.
Mayor Bob Simpson feels that the 400 block is perhaps missing in all of this.
Once Council gets into post pricing and fine tuning of the project, he feels it would be interesting to have a conversation with that block…
“Particularly the restaurants in that block about what we could do to integrate their sidewalk with what we’ve got, and what it could do in terms of outdoor patio space for those restaurants.”
If all goes well construction on this project would take place in 2018.