Ramping up
Traffic delays expected to increase
Work on Highway 125 twinning heats up for summer.
Work along Highway 125 has ramped up as the multi-year highway twinning project heads toward a fall completion date.
Construction picked up late in May when the contractor Municipal Ready-Mix began working near the Cape Breton Regional Hospital.
In recent weeks operations have expanded to the George Street exit and Cow Bay Road where subgrade is being built.
“This will cover putting our gravel on our subgrade and paving everything from the new Membertou interchange to Grand Lake Road,” said Lloyd Hall, a project engineer.
“Our concrete barrier down the centre will be complete and our interchange at George Street, all those ramps will be tied in.”
When the latest phase of work is completed in October or early November, the highway will have been expanded to four lanes from Sydney River to Grand Lake Road, with the exception of some areas of the highway that will feature six lanes.
“The last piece of the puzzle is a final paving project that repaves everything from Sydney River Exit 6 and all the way to Grand Lake Road, and that won’t be until next year.”
No significant traffic delays are being currently being experience with the exception of trucks en- tering and exiting work zones.
That is expected to change somewhat later in the summer, though.
“In the next month to six weeks we’ll start having impacts to George Street ramps,” said Hall. “There will be some temporary ramps to move traffic around as we work, and then as the project progresses eventually traffic will be detoured on what we are building so we can do work on the existing sections of the highway.”
Though not part of this construction project, the province also announced plans last year to build a $3.5-million, two-lane roundabout in place of the intersection at Grand Lake Road, Highway 125 and the Sydney Port Access Road.
A $1.8-million overpass spanning across Highway 125 to provide safe access for pedestrians and cyclists is also in the works.