Road rationalization report finally adopted by Essex County council

There was a round of applause in the Essex County council chambers last week from councillors, administration and staff as the long-awaited road rationalization study was presented and adopted.

“It’s the report we’ve been waiting for for years,” said Warden Hilda MacDonald.

Director of infrastructure and planning services Allan Botham presented the 75-page report that, over the next two to seven years will see the responsibility of 42.8 km of county roads either uploaded to the county or downloaded to one of the seven local municipalities.

“I’m happy we were able to pull it together for this term of council,” said Botham.

It was his final report to the county as the director as, after 4.5 years, he is leaving to take a job with his former employer, the Municipality of Leamington.

In his report he said that the road rationalization would be a multi-year transfer plan and would include all roads, bridges and culverts. When the actual transfers will occur is yet to be determined.

“We’ve considered the timing, and this sounds basic, but we landed on an agreement that any transfer should occur on a given year after a winter maintenance season,” said Botham.

What this means to the Town of Amherstburg is that County Road 5 from County Road 18 to Alma St. will be declassified as a connecting link. County Road 5 (the Concession 2 North portion) from County Road 10 (Middle Side Road) to the ETR tracks will be transferred to Amherstburg and County Road 16 (Alma St.) from County Road 20 to County Road 5 (the Meloche Road portion) will be declassified as a connecting link.

“When it talks about recommended settlement or payout, which means when the connecting link is transferred to the local municipal partner, the county will transfer funds to cover the cost of future upgrades or could there be a cost to the local municipality?” asked Amherstburg Deputy Mayor Chris Gibb.

While Botham said there could be several options for financial implications, the county’s director of financial services/treasurer Melissa Ryan commented the future cost of maintenance would be the responsibility of, in this case, Amherstburg.

Ryan explained that any roads transferred would be expected to be in good condition.

“After that, it would be on the local municipality who got the road to start saving for the future which is a typical practice,” said Ryan.

Also in the report is the possibility of Concession 3 being uploaded to the county.

Of the 42.8 km in the plan, 3.0 km will be uploaded to the county, 9.8 km uploaded to the county connecting link, 19.9 km removed from the county network and 10.1 from the county connecting link.

Botham said that the road rationalization was a collaborated plan by both local municipal and county staff.

“We did really dig into all of the details. Your teams and our team tried to uncover every rock and stone we could and get into the details,” said Botham.

The current county road network was based on a roads needs study dating back to the early 1970’s and from that time to the 2000’s, 140 km of roads was transferred from the province to Essex County.

Speaking on the new report, LaSalle Mayor Crystal Meloche said, “this is the most regional thing we have done in the last three-and-a-half years.”

Road rationalization report finally adopted by Essex County council

By Fred Groves