Summer construction season begins in Toronto, more than 200 projects planned

City gears up for summer of construction projects The city is slated to spend more than $720 million on a myriad of summer road, watermain and infrastructure repairs over the summer.

The end of the bitter cold weather has made way for Toronto’s next official season – construction.

This year, the city plans to spend nearly $720 million on road, bridge, water main and pothole work. It will be spread across more than 200 scheduled projects.

Of that total amount, approximately $360 million will go toward repairing and resurfacing expressways, major arterial roads and bridges. About $299 million is slated for water and sewer repair and rehabilitation. Just over $61 million is set aside for the city’s basement flooding protection program.

All told, about 140 kilometres of road will be resurfaced over the coming months.

Public Works Chair Jaye Robinson said that while this year’s $15 million boost will help, it’s likely not enough to remedy the estimated $3 billion backlog for transportation infrastructure and approximately $5.5 billion repair backlog for Toronto Water infrastructure.

She said crews will aim to “bundle the work” when possible.

“So when we’re digging, we’re also doing resurfacing work at the same time,” she told reporters at a news conference on Wednesday. “Years ago we weren’t doing that, but now we’re really focused on coordination and bundling that work so it’s all happening in one swoop.”

Potholes are also on the city’s agenda this summer as damage lingers from a harsh winter.

Since the start of the year, city crews have completed four “major pothole repair blitzes” and the mayor recently announced additional efforts for the month of May.

Between 20 and 30 crews are scheduled to work extended hours over the next few weeks to repair damage caused by a harsh winter and subsequent freeze-thaw cycle.

In just the last seven days, crews have filled 10,000 potholes. The new effort brings the total number of potholes filled this year to 148,000 -- compared to 200,000 in all of 2017.

Robinson said maintenance will play just as big a role as restoration this year, noting that city’s water main network is a prime example of what happens when council “lets things slide.”

“Bottom line is, this term and even last term we’ve really been very focused on the infrastructure. It’s aging and, in some cases, our water mains are well over 100 years old,” she said.

“As we see extreme weather events in the city are becoming more of a way of life, we’ve had several in the last few months, we need to make sure we’re not just building them but also improving them.”

The barrage of summer construction starts with a major undertaking in Regent Park.

Starting Monday, May 14 at 5 a.m., the Gerrard and Parliament streets intersection will be closed in all directions for three weeks while crews work to replace TTC streetcar tracks.

Robinson said the intersection will be “completely reconstructed” and crews will work 24 hours a day, seven days a week to complete the project.

Crews have been instructed to complete noisier tasks before 11 p.m. and will “make every effort to minimize disruption,” Robinson said.

“Efforts will be made to manage traffic in the area for the safety of workers, road users and of course residents,” she said. “If you use this intersection in your daily travels, you should use alternate routes such as Jarvis Street, River Street, Carlton Street and Dundas Street instead.”

The construction will also force a number of TTC routes to divert, including the 506/306 Carlton, the 65/365 Parliament, and buses will supplement streetcar routes when necessary.

The work will last until June 4.

“This is just one of over 200 projects planned this season, 60 major and about 150-ish that are local streets,” Robinson said. “It’s a very big undertaking.”

Some of the projects planned for this summer include:

Information about road restrictions related to construction can be found at the City of Toronto website.