Boundary Road Open
Prince George-Valemount MLA Shirley Bond, Prince George Mackenzie MLA Mike Morris, Henry Remple, Prince George Airport CEO John Gibson, and Mayor Shari Green
Prince George, B.C. – Boundary road is now, officially open.
Initially, the official "ribbon cutting" was to take place on the road itself, but today's weather put a damper on that plan. Instead, officials cut the ribbon in the warmth of the Prince George Airport, over the 3D plan for the logistics park and Boundary Road .
The road has been on the City of Prince George’s wish list for four decades, a road that would link Highway 16 to Highway 97 on the west side of the airport, a road that would become a critical part of the dangerous goods route .
It was not until the Prince George Airport put together it’s plans to develop a logistics park, that the real potential for Boundary Road became apparent.
Businessman Henry Remple had assembled a parcel of more than 2000 acres of land west of the Airport. He had a dream for an industrial park. With the Airport looking to develop its own logistics park, Remple’s dream was a step closer to reality.
Remple agreed to provide the land for Boundary Road, as well as millions of dollars to help get a commitment from the Provincial and Federal Government. “Then along came the Economic Action Plan by the Fedral Government, and the timing was perfect” says remple.
With cash injections of $7.5 million each from the Federal and Provincial Governmnents, and $6.5 million each from the City and the private developers ( Remple and Inland Kenworth) the full budgeted amount for the construction of the two lane 6.5 kilometer strip was in place.
The project itself is about a year overdue, but City Superintendent of Operations, Bill Gaal says that doesn’t mean there will be any impact on the overall cost of the project. “There was a contingency built into the budget, there always is” says Gaal. He says the contractor was very smart in that materials were purchased up front, meaning there was no inflation added to the price even though those materials may not have been needed until much later down the line. Work was slowed during an unusually wet construction season when the project first got underway, so workers were placed on other projects until conditions improved to have them return to Boundary Road.
Remple says his “Phase one” of the logistics park will be completed this spring and he is promising to work very hard to promote the airport and the second phase of development.
Crews can still be seen working along Boundary Road, (photo at right) laying in connector lines, but the roadway itself is open to traffic.
Comments
Glad to see this finally open but boy do I hate seeing mayor green and her fake smile.
The name is Rempel …. not Remple
How about Tempel?
Nope, maybe Rumpelstiltskin
Chloe, I thought that most high school students had more substance than that these days. If you’re going to make a statement like that Mayor Green deserves to know your full name.
Sure would like to know what all these Dangerous Goods are that will go through this road.
The road itself is a road to nowhere until they build **another** bridge across the Fraser to connect with Highway 16 West. Even then traffic would be minimal, however you would be able to access 97 South much faster if you were coming in from the West. In fact it would work like a bypass for all traffic going West of Prince George and South to Vancouver, or East to Edmonton.
I suspect that they will have a huge truck stop, restaurant, hotel/motel/ Inland Kenworth facility, and some other smaller business’ locate in the Industrial Park.
A Bypass of course would/could eliminate a lot of business for Prince George, as people would just keep going South, or West. No need to stop here, unless this is your destination.
If people want to bypass PG they already could…. It’s called the Old Cariboo Highway. This will keep trucks off of Sintich, Elis and Johnson roads. Their neighbourhood just got quieter. What baffles me is why oh why did they build such a tight round about on a truck route! Haven’t they learned a lesson from the Cameron street bridge round about? Start counting the tip overs folks!
Chloe, I think everyone feels that way about mayor Green
Would any of these anonymous posters make those comments to her face? Highly doubtful.
JB, would you? No, I know you haven’t trolled her worship in this particular thread, but why should that stop others from expressing their true feelings? Are you that genuine with everyone you know that you tell off the folks you don’t care for to their face? Normal human social interaction simply doesn’t work that way, so maybe you should stop holding others to an impossible standard.
Drove it tonight. Coming onto Hwy 97 was fun as the merge lane was quite short and very difficult when the speed limit in that area is 90km/h.
Catty comments about a person’s smile or clothes or their lack of “cool” reflects more negatively on the commentator than on the subject. I don’t understand why anyone would think it’s “impossible” to refrain from using this forum to bully anonymously.
I thought Chloe had a good point, Furbank. I don’t think there are many people in PG that are impressed with Mayor Green, I don’t think she needs to know everyone’s name that isn’t impressed with her.
“Chief” Green just has to wait until next November. Who’s yer friend, eh?
I’m not impressed with her and I am not anonymous to most if not all on Council and several in the administration.
So, someone thinks she has a fake smile. Big deal.
Many people in the public media have that …. they have learned to say “cheese” when the camera is about to click, even if they wish they would hurry so they can get out of there to their private lives.
If I were to define that particular moment of a smile that was captured, it would be cutesy, coy.
At least she managed to look into the 250news camera. The three on the left didn’t.
Gibson and Green knew which the important camera was … ;-)
NoWay. You missed my point. I was talking about a bypass if there was a new bridge across the Fraser River connecting 16 with 97 South. Traffic from the West ie; Pr Rupert to Vanderhoof heading South could directly connect from Highway 16 to 97 South. Traffic from 97 South would go directly West over the new bridge and bypass downtown Prince George.
The long range plan is to build this Bridge, so over time it will have a detrimental effect on Prince George. However on the up side it might produce more business for Vanderhoof, and Quesnel, as long as they don’t get into gouging.
Project cost. $28 Million.
Contract for the road was given to Western Industrial Contractors for a total of $18,723,627.00 So we are looking at aprox $4,117,647.00 per km. Project was a year late.
I did not see the promoter in the picture.
Project cost. $28 Million.
Contract for the road was given to Western Industrial Contractors for a total of $18,723,627.00 So we are looking at aprox $4,117,647.00 per km. Project was a year late.
I did not see the promoter in the picture.
I would personally like to see that bridge built. Its been in the plans since the ’70’s at least. I don’t think people and a lot of trucks that are just passing through anyway, bother to stop now, as it is. Its just an aggravation to go all the way to the Hwy 16, 97 junction or shortcut through Ferry Ave to get on their way south.
This idea about PG losing a lot of business because of it is hogwash.
Palopu – dangerous goods are things as common as a gas tanker or a freight trailer containing batteries. It’s just trying to limit the amount these ” hazardous ” materials travel past more densely populated areas.
Yep I did miss your point Palopu! A bridge connecting highway 97 to 16 west would be awsome.
Palopu wrote: “over time it will have a detrimental effect on Prince George”
That is old wisdom. Truckers who frequent the same stops will likely not change. I would expect that the change will come based on origin-destination distance and break time locations for maintenance of both trucks and drivers.
The additional draw will be availability of convenient truck stops.
In the US there are proper rest stops with separate entrances, parking and pull though to exits for truckers as well as private vehicles pulling trailers and RVs.
The have proper washing facilities, showers and toilets. They are used well. I have yet to see one like that in BC. Maybe there are some on the Trans Canada somewhere.
There are private ones as well with the same services, plus gas, diesel, electrical hook ups, sani stations, wash bays for trucks, etc. etc.
As I keep realizing, we live in the boonies. BUT maybe someone will put one in if PG is seen as a good location for a stop like that. It should be because it is at a cross road.
Problem is, there are too many crossings of the two highways even now. Looks like there will be more in the future.
If the bridge comes, the airport turn off where there I a station, store and restaurant of sorts would be an excellent location for such a stop, if the bridge is actually built there.
In the final analysis, the bridge might be built closer to the new scale location, with the Sintich Rd bridge being a city arterial instead of a provincial highway.
A new bridge over the Fraser is getting a step ahead of things. Next priority for regional transportation clearly should be an overpass at the busiest rail crossing in BC on Boundary Road… connecting to the new airport logistic park.
We have a rail crossing safety issue… one of productivity for the industry that gets tied up in mile long line ups while rail cars are moved… and we can double the available industrial land serviced for the airport logistics park by providing efficient access to the North Willow multi-million dollar infrastructure sitting unused currently. It seems to me this is required before we could have a Fraser crossing at that location.
BTW If I had to make a critical point of Ms Green’s demeanor… I would have to say its the way she shakes her head from side to side while lecturing… its as if to say she is projecting that she rejects any dissent even before anyone has objected… a kind of preemptive don’t even go there while she is speaking. To me it says she can not handle any criticism and is a way of looking down on her listening audience. Once one notices this it really sticks out and is an irritant for anyone that tries to take her seriously.
I could be wrong, but body language is an important way to gauge how genuine a politician is.
While on the subject my take is she has similar demeanor to ‘Ms Heddy’ on Despicable Me. They captured the head nod perfectly
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