Span closed for eight years will be rebuilt
YOU ASK. WE ANSWER. Q: Could you please do a follow up of your Search Engine article from June 27, 2015 regarding the Mewburn Road Bridge Closure? It’s still closed and there’s been no progress.
A: Good news is ahead for the troubled Niagara Falls bridge closed since April 2009.
After years of negotiations with the city of Niagara Falls, CN has agreed to contribute up to $1.5 million towards replacing Mewburn Road bridge.
Geoff Holman, Niagara Falls director of municipal works, said the city is moving ahead with an engineering design and confirming previous cost sharing commitments by the town of Niagara-onthe-Lake and Niagara Region.
“The ball’s rolling very slowly but we’re moving towards a permanent solution, absolutely,” Holman said.
The bridge is on the border of Niagara Falls and Niagara-onthe-Lake, where Mewburn Road becomes Concession 6 Road. It’s south of Warner Road and adjacent to the Bruce Trail.
It was shut down in 2009 for safety reasons. CN, which owns the bridge, originally said it was willing to pay $578,000 to replace what was there. But the two municipalities wanted to seize the opportunity to build a larger span for today’s traffic needs.
Building a larger bridge that can accommodate emergency vehicles and snowplows was estimated to cost $2.6 million in 2010.
Since then, the city has been negotiating with CN, which agreed this past fall to pay 50 per cent of the project cost, up to a maximum $1.5 million.
Niagara Falls city council accepted the new funding commitment in November.
In addition to the CN money, Niagara-on-the-Lake previously committed $250,000 to the project, with the city and Region agreeing to split the additional costs. That cost sharing has to be firmed up once a detailed design and cost analysis is done.
Niagara Falls has hired Ellis Engineering of St. Catharines to prepare a preliminary design and look at different bridge sizes. Ellis built the Merritt Street bridge over the CN railway tracks in Merritton.
“We’re looking to come up with a cost effective solution that will give us a wider bridge deck to accommodate the heavier vehicles and the Bruce Trail,” Holman said.
Holman said they should be able to have a public information meeting this spring.
Construction is not expected to begin until spring 2018.
Q: Has anyone ever noted that there are no clocks, excluding game timers, in the Meridian Centre?
A: Unlike at some Vegas casinos where it’s rumoured there are no clocks so people gamble longer, there’s no strategic reason for a lack of timepieces at the Meridian Centre.
Director of marketing Kay Meilleur said the score clock always has the time of day on it, except during games when it becomes a countdown clock or, “a reverse clock.”
During “dark events” like concerts, Meilleur said there isn’t a clock because they don’t have the scoreboard lit up.
Meilleur said there’s really no reason they don’t have clocks positioned around the arena — they just weren’t included. Clocks that glow would have to be turned off during concerts or non-sporting events anyway because promoters wants a completely dark house. “If people want to know the time, I think 99.9 per cent of people have cellphones or watches so they’re all looking at the time that way,” Meilleur said.