Downtown Hamilton residents advised of ‘some noise’ from overnight LRT excavation work

Hamilton | Latest News | Transit |

By

Published August 22, 2022 at 3:37 pm

Denizens of downtown Hamilton hear “some noise” overnight over the next two evenings, due to the prep work for the city’s light-rail transit line.

The City of Hamilton says “overnight exploratory work” for the LRT will be conducted from 9 p.m. till 5 a.m. at two King St. locations. One is on the south side of King W., around the corner from the Frank A. Cooke Transit Terminal on MacNab St. S.. The other is on the north side of King E., between James and Hughson streets.

Metrolinx, the provincial transit agency, recently detailed how the construction on King St., Main St. and Queenston Rd. in Stoney Creek will take place as the LRT built.

Last week, many Hamilton social media users said they felt there was a lack of suffienct notice when Stelco executed a controlled detonation of a blast furnace structure.

The 17-stop LRT line will run from Eastgate Square in Stoney Creek to McMaster University in West Hamilton. The process of a binding all-governments commitment to the Hamilton LRT was 14 years in the making, or exactly one year for every kilometre of the east-west line. The deal will make Hamilton the eighth Canadian city to add LRT, joining Brampton, Calgary, Edmonton, Mississauga, Ottawa, Toronto and Vancouver.

The city, whose downtown is on a wedge of land between Burlington Bay and the Niagara Escarpment, first studied light rail in 2007. Non-binding commitments to LRT were made toward the end of the 2010s, before the Ontario PC Party government called off the project in December 2019. But last year, both senior levels of government committed to split the construction cost 50-50 if the City of Hamilton covered the operating costs. The cost of building was estimated at $3.4 billion. The latter will run $6.4M to $16.5M annually.

After much debate, Hamilton city council voted 13-0 last Sept. 15 to ratify the MOU (memorandum of understanding) with Metrolinx and the Ontario Ministry of Transportation (MTO) to build the line.

insauga's Editorial Standards and Policies advertising