No ‘sidewalk to nowhere’ for street reconstruction

Councillors voted Monday to do a $3million reconstruction of Moorecraig Road and Roper Drive in the city’s west end this summer — but the project won’t include a short stretch of sidewalk that the neighbours don’t want, which one ward councillor called “a sidewalk to nowhere.”

Coun. Henry Clarke moved that the stretch of sidewalk on the north side of Roper Drive from Wallis Drive to a point 30 metres west of Moorecraig Road be deleted from the project. He said the proposed sidewalk would span just two properties and doesn’t lead anywhere.

Instead, councillors gave preliminary approval at a committee meeting Monday to put the savings from not building that sidewalk — an estimated $30,000 — into a fund meant for building other sidewalks across the city.

The plan needs a final vote at an upcoming city council meeting. Councillors debated it at length on Monday.

Coun. Stephen Wright said he wanted the $30,000 saved from not building the sidewalk to go into paving roads in the Simons subdivision, just off Chemong Road near Shoppers Drug Mart.

The subdivision was part of Smith Township (now known as Selwyn Township) from the time its 64 houses were built in the 1970s until it was amalgamated into the city in 2008.

As an amalgamated subdivision it lacks Peterborough city services such as water and sewer, and the streets also don’t have sidewalks or street lights.

Wright said the city has filled 386 potholes in the subdivision over the last two weeks.

But many councillors said they have roads in their wards in equally poor condition: Coun. Keith Riel and Coun. Gary Baldwin both said there are roads in Ashburnham Ward that are just as bad as those in the Simons subdivision, for example.

Coun. Lesley Parnell said she’s “not unsympathetic” to the concerns of Simons subdivision residents, but that there’s a list of the worst roads in Peterborough — and the city is repaving in order of need.

“We want to continue with our list, looking after the worst roads first,” she said.

“The residents of Simons subdivision don’t want your sympathy — they want their roads fixed,” Wright replied.

If council gives the plan a final vote of approval at a council meeting on May 25, the reconstruction of Moorecraig Road and Roper Drive is to start in June and be done by this fall.