A very pricey project

Some scheduled Summerside ditch infilling will go undone this year

Summerside will spend almost all of the $504,700 it set aside for ditch infilling this year on one street instead of the two it was intended for. Council voted Monday night to award the tender for the work to the lowest bidder, which was Curran and Briggs Ltd.

The money will go towards filling the ditches and installing new storm sewer infrastructure on Westchester Street from Hillside Drive to Ross Street. Once that is done, the city will re-evaluate to see if there is enough funding left in the budget to start work on the second intended project area of MacWilliams Drive, from the Corner of Briggs St. to the high point on MacWilliams Drive. If there is, work will start there too.

This decision comes after councillors were shocked to learn at their last committee meeting that the tender for the work on the two streets had closed with the lowest bidder offering to do the work for $822,378, much higher than expected.

Facing a project price tag one councillor called “desperately wrong,” council asked staff to take another look at the numbers and report back with some answers.

Technical services director Aaron MacDonald did just that, explaining that readily available federal water and sewer infrastructure money this year has put a premium on the time of contractors. He also said the price of the pipes used in this kind of work has skyrocketed in recent years. These costs are in addition to normal yearly increases.

MacDonald also warned that high prices to do infilling are probably not going away anytime soon.

“We’re getting to the point where I could be putting a whole new subdivision in for the cost of what we’re doing in infill afterwards. There’s a challenge to coming back afterwards – when you add on to a house it’s more expensive than if you start new,” said MacDonald.

Council has tried to cut back the cost of ditch infilling in recent years by scaling back the scope of the work, but the price per metre of ditch continues to climb.

There has been suggestion from some councillors in the past that the city abandon the ditch infilling program, and the issue is almost always contentious when it comes up. Coun. Bruce MacDougall, who has often spoken in support of ditch infilling, did so again Monday. However, he did suggest, as did other councillors, that the city consider doing the work itself next year to help cut costs.

“It’s getting outrageous, the pricing,” said MacDougall.

But he added, “We’re committed to this, (the people) deserve it and we need to find a way to do it.”