Manitoba Infrastructure says improvements to the Trans-Canada Highway from Ste. Anne to Dufresne will not get done this fall. Doug Struthers, Director of Regional Operations, says the contractor, Nelson River Construction, originally had full intentions of getting the work completed before freeze-up.

"Unfortunately, the work is going to be done next summer due to scheduling problems. They had a lot of bad weather in their projects up in northern Manitoba. It delayed their projects and they won't be able to get to our project this year."

Struthers says the contractor will pay a financial penalty for not getting the work done on time and that money will be used for some temporary fixes.

"We set up contracts to reflect our expectations, so we set a completion date and we'll also have a financial penalty when the contractors don't meet the completion date. We are going to use the funds that we penalized the contractor and we're going to go out and patch the loops on the interchange (at Highway #12) and we're going to patch the major bumps where the previous work on the box culverts was done. We're going to do that this fall."

Struthers adds the contractor has informed Manitoba Infrastructure it will be moving its asphalt plant to the construction site this fall and then as soon as the frost is out of the ground next spring, it will start work on the project.

Meanwhile, a secondary part of this contract, the paving of PR 210, south from Centrale Avenue in Ste. Anne and west to Highway #12 will be done this fall.