Downtown businesses have bone to pick with city, road work contractor

City officials and the people responsible for ongoing reconstruction of Queen Street are about to get an earful from a frustrated Downtown Association. 

While generally satisfied with the work, Nicholas Luck, the association's executive director, expressed concern Wednesday night to his board of directors that their concerns about five outstanding issues are being ignored.

"They'll return the email, but within those specific items, they haven't done anything," Luck said.

"Although work is moving forward, we are still experiencing impacts related to the project. This includes no follow-up improvements from the city, [engineering consultant] AECOM and the general contractor that we have requested," Luck said.

Here are five issues as presented by Luck to his board:

• improvements to the temporary sidewalks to have a safer surface for those accessing it, such as the use of plywood as a base
• no signage has been created and placed on Albert and Bay Street to indicate businesses are open and where alternative entrances are located
• short notice communications to properties on scheduled water shut offs have resulted in substantial costs to some members
• no guaranteed compensation stream for businesses that have experienced loss of revenue due to construction
• the inclusion of Downtown Association in the biweekly meetings between the city, AECOM and the general contractor

Luck expressed appreciation to the city and SooToday for providing progress updates on the construction work and to the city for temporarily lifting parking enforcement in the work zones.

"The project remains on track for substantial completion by late fall, with some work extending into 2025," Luck said, adding: "We are currently still working on remediation of these concerns."

"Construction in commercial areas is always disruptive. However, more support is needed to assist our members for the duration of the project."

Queen Street is now closed from March to Elgin and will remain closed until early October.

This year's Queen Street reconstruction is expected to be substantially completed by late this fall with some work possibly continuing into 2025.

Downtown businesses remain open during the Queen Street project with front and back entrances and parking options available for shoppers and other customers.

A temporary supply source will be used this week to energize new street lighting on the north side of Queen Street between March and Spring.

Installation of boulevard pavers is also expected to be completed on the north side of the same block.