Glenday surface suffering under added traffic volume

On Wednesday morning Lennoxville resident Jean-claude Bégin sent a message to Lennoxville Borough President Claude Charron inquiring about the deteriorating state of Glenday Road. Bégin, who had previously come before Sherbrooke’s city council to petition for improvements to the notoriously pockmarked roadway in 2016, said in his letter that although the situation had improved following his previous interventions, the road has been in decline since the start of this year.

“In the spring of 2017, the paved surface was pulverized and afterward the maintenance of the road was very well done,” Bégin wrote. “This year, it is quite different: Traffic is increased because of the closure of the Bishop Bridge. As soon as it rains, potholes reappear. There is negligence in resurfacing the road and filling the potholes; which makes the road deteriorate rapidly but when the grader returns to do its job, it does it too superficially and the road remains rough.”

The concerned citizen goes on to explain that although he has called the Sherbrooke help line, 819-821-5858, the calls don’t appear to have made any difference.

“Driving on the road has once again become dangerous because of the poor state of the road and the excessive traffic that refuses to slow down,” Bégin added, asking why the condition of the road has become so poor when he was told in 2016 that pulverizing the paved surface would make maintenance simpler.

Contacted by The Record about Bégin’s letter, Charron said that the higher volume of cars on the road is to blame for the issue.

“What’s happening is that with the cars going around the bridge construction, we can’t complete the work we’re supposed to,” the Borough President said, explaining that the combination of high traffic volume and speeding results in more wear and tear.

Charron said that the city doesn’t have a good solution to the problem so long as people are using the Glenday route to detour around the bridge construction, but he did note that the police have been asked to increase patrols along Glenday and Campbell Street to help keep speed down. He pointed out that the removal of the surface along Glenday in the spring of 2017 was meant to be a stop-gap solution to keep the road usable until it is replaced by the endpoint of the Highway 410 extension.

David Bombardier of the city of Sherbrooke’s Communications department said that the city has planned work add more gravel to the entire road surface, but explained that as the work will take a day or two to complete it is being reserved until after work on the bridge is complete.

Reached later in the day on Wednesday, Bégin said that he found that response unacceptable

“It is important that this work be done,” the resident said, adding that he has contemplated reducing the number of trips he makes out of the house to avoid having to drive over the terrible surface. “The traffic can wait.”

Bégin highlighted the fact that what he considers to be a lack of proper maintenance on Glenday started well before the bridge closure, and said that although a crew from the city comes any time he calls about an issue, the fact that he needs to call strikes him as an issue.

“I didn’t have to call once last year,” he said.