‘This will undoubtedly cause disruption’: Major construction set to close Saskatoon University Bridge

Construction season is starting off with some major traffic headaches after the long weekend. Keenan Sorokan reports.

Construction season is starting off with some major traffic headaches after the long weekend.

Projects along College Drive, the University Bridge and 25th Street will close or heavily reduce traffic along the major artery of the city for much of the next four months.

“This will undoubtedly cause disruption for people. But these construction projects are necessary to protect our valuable infrastructure,” director of transportation Jay Magus said at a news conference explaining the projects on Thursday.

Starting Monday, the University Bridge is closing until mid-June except to emergency vehicles. Once work is complete at the intersection of Clarence Avenue and College Drive, the bridge will open one lane in each direction until August. Patients, staff and visitors at Royal University Hospital will only be able to access it from the westbound lanes on College Drive until the bridge reopens to traffic.

It’s part of extensive construction on the bridge, which will repair an archway near Spadina Crescent, beginning on April 16 and lasting until the end of July. The cost for that project alone is slated at $1.5 million.

Bus routes will continue along College and over the bridge until access to Clarence Avenue is restricted. The pedestrian walkway on the bridge will remain open.

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Once those areas open to one lane of traffic each way on College Drive and the University Bridge, construction will extend for blocks on both sides of the river for months.

“This full closure is a factor of the closure that needs to happen at college,” director of technical services Dan Willems said. " There’s no sense in keeping the bridge open if you can’t go anywhere when you get to the other side of the river."

A $50 million project to prepare College Drive’s transformation for Link, the city’s upcoming bus rapid transit program, will happen in three phases — first beginning with work from Clarence Avenue to University Drive during the full closure. Then crews will move to the north side of Hospital Drive to Cumberland Avenue and flip over to the south side after that. A majority of closures are expected to be lifted by the end of August before students return to campus.

Much of the work is to build dedicated bus lanes and install Link platforms, shelters and necessary infrastructure such as SaskEnergy adjusting gas mains under the Clarence Avenue intersection and the green space north of College Drive.

More work will continue next year along the street to prepare for Link’s launch in 2028, which will have dedicated bus lanes flowing in each direction along the existing median with transit platforms throughout. Vehicle traffic will be reduced to two lanes in each direction.

“Is it perfect? No. But again, these projects will protect and strengthen our assets and in the case of BRT, completely modernize our transit system,” Magus said.

The project marks the third straight summer of major work along College Drive.

Motorists won’t have any relief on the other side of the street either. The city is planning to close parts of 25th Street from 1st Avenue to Spadina Crescent for four months once it begins on May 19. One lane of traffic in each direction will remain open, but intersections may close at times. Another three months of construction on 24th Street is expected next year.

Some frustration is expected, but a little grace will help everyone get through the construction period safely," the city’s director of construction and design, Matt Jurkiewicz, said.

“We are asking that road users follow our construction signage and detour information and respect the work zones at all times.”

To help ease traffic congestion in other areas of the city, Magus says intersections will be studied to adjust traffic light sequencing to move more vehicles through at known high-volume times. He says the city has learned a lot about traffic behaviour with its many bridge closures in recent years.

The Broadway Bridge closed from May to October last year for rehabilitation work.

“There’s adequate capacity in all the other infrastructure,” Magus said. When we closed the University Bridge 11 years ago, I remember the headline ‘bridge-ageddon,’ and that didn’t happen. Broadway handled the traffic quite easily."