Park Road West to be fully reopened to traffic Thursday

After nearly one year and two months of construction, Park Road West will finally be fully reopened to traffic Thursday morning. 

The road was first closed in early September of 2022. Construction was put on hold in November as winter conditions set in, then resumed in May. The first phase, from E.G. Penner Building Centre to just past the old campground, was reopened mid-July and crews have been working on the second phase ever since. 

Aaron Rach is the Head Engineer for the City of Steinbach. He says the final touches are just now being completed. 

“They’re removing the barricades and the temporary signage, putting up the permanent roadside signage and just doing general cleanup of the site.” 

Rach says he is excited that Park Road is finally complete. 

“We're happy to have this project wrapped up and that connectivity to the rest of the city will be restored.” He adds, “It's been a long time coming and I'm sure the residents are as [happy] well.” 

Park Road West is now fully paved and twinned to Industrial Road 

Park Road West is now fully paved and twinned west from E.G. Penner all the way to just past Industrial Road. At that point, it goes back down to two lanes and transitions from cement to gravel. 

Rach says they are grateful to have gotten this work complete before a wave of winter weather sweeps through the Southeast. 

“We kind of made it in just under the buzzer here. That was fortunate timing because it doesn't look like there'll be too much construction activity after this week.” 

On October 11th, we reported that the road would be reopened before the last of the landscaping was completed. Fortunately, Rach says that process was able to be done earlier than expected and the entire project will be complete when the road is reopened on Thursday. 

In fact, Rach notes there are a few ways in which the last couple of weeks of construction went more smoothly than expected.  

The transition from concrete back to gravel is done with asphalt, and he says, “We were fortunate in that the contractor was able to move ahead their schedule for the paving so that that really helped to get the project done as quickly as it was and then and beat the nasty weather.” 

In response to Canada's Online News Act and Meta (Facebook and Instagram) removing access to local news from their platforms, SteinbachOnline encourages you to get your news directly from your trusted source by bookmarking this page and downloading the SteinbachOnline app.