2021-02-03

New Highway 103 interchange one of many area road works projects planned this year

by KEITH CORCORAN

  • <p>SOURCE: NOVA SCOTIA DEPARTMENT OF TRANSPORTATION AND INFRASTRUCTURE RENEWAL WEBSITE</p><p>A concept of how the new Highway 103 exit 12A will look in Bridgewater.</p>

Upcoming construction on the new Highway 103 interchange between the Cookville and Wileville exits is one of the major projects on the horizon for this area as contained in the province's latest blueprint of new roadwork coming up in fiscal year 2021-22.

The $50 million, cost-shared project starts this spring and is expected to finish in 2022. Bridgewater's mayor, David Mitchell, took to social media to call the project a positive step that brightens the future for generations to come.

A new bridge, ramps, roundabouts and connector roads make up significant aspects of the job. Bridgewater's spending included intersection changes and realignments in the business park. The new interchange will connect the business park on the town's west side to 50 hectares of developable property to the north which Bridgewater owns.

"This creates opportunities for new businesses that were, until this project, simply not possible. We've had a number of companies inquiring about Bridgewater ... but the current business park was inadequate for their needs," Mitchell said in a message posted on his mayoral platform.

"This also reduces the pressure on the Wileville entrance to Logan Road and Silver's Hill at North Street as people on the west side of the river have a more direct route to and from the highway."

Also cut is travel time for trucks and transport of goods and services in-and-out of the business park, which will have easier access to Highway 103.

A multi-year Highway 103 twinning project between Ingramport and Hubbards is identified in the province's 2021-22 improvement plan. The new passing lanes between the Chester Basin and Oakland exits is identified as a multi-year project,but only because the work straddles two fiscal years. That work wraps up in late June.

The Indian Path Bridge on Highway 332, near Riverport, was supposed to be a rehabilitation project last year but reappears in 2021-22. "It was determined that it would be more cost effective to replace the structure," Peter McLaughlin, a spokesman for the transportation department, told LighthouseNOW in an email. "Design work for the new replacement span is underway."

This year's work also includes "intersection improvements" where MacCulloch Road meets Highway 10 in Cookville. "The main enhancement ... includes the addition of a left-turn lane on MacCulloch into the Tim Hortons," McLaughlin said. "This will improve both access into the Tim Hortons, while also improving traffic flow through the intersection. It will make that intersection much safer."

Among asphalt repaving projects taking place in 2021-22, are on Highway 103 (between Camperdown School Road and the Queens County line), Highway 332 (between the Riverport bridge and Highway 3), Highway 3 (between Liverpool boundary and White Point), and Highway 10 (between Bridgewater town line and Pine Grove Road).

Other planned repaving include sections of Masons Beach Road, Upper Branch Road, Medway River Road, and Barss Corner Road. What's referred to as "maintenance paving" is aimed at Beech Hill Road.

Sections of several gravel roads are also getting a refresh. Those are Langille Lake Road, Stanford Lake Road, Sweetland Road, Wagner Road and Labelle Road.

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