Brooks figures big in budget
Planning a new overpass west of Brooks has been added to the provincial road construction plan for 2024, and after a $5 million study last year of the Eyremore Reservoir in the county or Newell, for feasibility work with be done in 2024.
Engineering work to build an overpass at the junction of Highway No. 36 and the TransCanada was included in the document, released the same day as the provincial budget released on Feb. 29. That is the first appearance of the project that was reportedly first studied in 2007.
That high-volume intersection Highway No. 36 is a designated high-load corridor for oversized loads running north to south in the province. It begins at Warner (at a junction with Highway No. 4 to Coutts) and runs almost 700 kilometres north to Lac La Biche. It also passes through Taber,
Hanna and the major Yellowhead Highway route, east of Edmonton.
The province plans to spend about $2.7 billion per year over three years on design, land acquisition and construction of new roads bridges and water infrastructure over the next three years.
Transportation and Economic Corridors Minister Devin Dreeschen told reporters at a press conference in Medicine Hat last week that the capital budget includes $156 million in funding for newly added projects
“Many are located along important economic corridors,” he said, noting another new project to plan for an overpass west of Strathmore to improve access to the planned De Havilland aircraft manufacturing facility in Wheatland County.
The province will also spend about $30 million in grants to counties to repair strategic but aging bridges and
provide $312 million in money for water management
One key project not in the transportation capital budget was first noted in the 2023-24 agriculture and irrigation budget was to spend $5 million toward studying the potential to build the Eyremore Reservoir, southwest of Brooks.
Environment Minister Rebecca Shulz stated this week that a feasibility review on the project is continuing though no new money is allocated.
The low end capacity being studied would be about equal to the existing Bassano Dam, with high-end potential being 600,000 acre feet.
That is apart from a near $1 billion three-way funding partnership with irrigation districts, the province and Ottawa to expand reservoirs.