Height allowance on McPhillips underpass to rise

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This article was published 17/07/2018 (2855 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

It wasn’t a bridge too far but a bridge too low — and it has mainly been a bridge over troubled truckers for years.

Every few months, an inattentive driver of a semi-trailer towering slightly above the 3.9 metres in height the McPhillips Street underpass was restricted to, would quite literally come to a crashing halt when the trailer smashed into the underside of the Canadian Pacific Railway crossing.

To have this happen, a trucker would have missed seeing a large, yellow warning sign on a lamppost more than a block before the underpass, would have missed the even larger, yellow warning sign on the bridge itself, and missed the red symbol on the City of Winnipeg’s truck route map showing the restriction.

But the current construction project, which will put the underpass north of Logan Avenue into seven months of street reconstruction and sewer rehabilitation work, will also result in the removal of the structure from the city’s list of places too low for some trucks to pass under.

Matthew Hildebrand, the city’s project engineer for the underpass project, said city hall is taking advantage of the necessary work to dig deeper into the earth.

“Part of the project was seeing if lowering the road was possible,” Hildebrand said. “They advised we could go down a foot. Trucks will no longer hit the bridge. There will be no issues with that underpass.”

For several years motorists — especially those driving north on the street — could look up at the rail crossing and see the pushed-in metal evidence from past truck collisions.

“By lowering by one foot — or 300 millimetres — the final profile will allow for a clearance of 4.2 metres… trucks will be able to pass safely through the underpass,” Hildebrand said.

It’s not the only thing that will change: future flooding in the underpass during a deluge of rain will also be reduced.

Hildebrand said the city has installed more sewage and drainage capacity at the site.

“We understand (the construction) is an inconvenience to the public, and we want to thank everyone for their patience,” he said. “It’s short-term pain for long-term gain.”

The construction started April 2, with traffic reduced to a single lane in each direction on McPhillips Street between Logan and Jarvis avenues.

Motorists have been asked to use alternate routes including Keewatin, Arlington or Salter streets.

Hildebrand said the construction will switch to the southbound lanes next month, with the entire project scheduled to be completed by November.

kevin.rollason@freepress.mb.ca