Drumheller Resiliency and Flood Mitigation office held their final community engagements for 2021 on Thursday, December 9, and discussed the scope of the Downtown Dike D project.
The Downtown Dike D project will be a 1.2 kilometre long berm that will extend from downtown at the Gordon Taylor Bridge to the corner of Riverside Drive and 5 Street East, better known as Schumacher’s corner.
“Dike D will be split into two phases-Gordon Taylor Bridge to the Badlands Community Facility (BCF), then Riverview Terrace condominiums to Schumacher’s Corner,” shared project director Deighen Blakely during the virtual meeting.
This will be the first dike to go to construction. Tendering for the project is expected to begin in the new year with construction being completed over spring and summer 2022.
Once completed, the berm will protect underground ATCO facilities and the lift station at Schumacher’s corner, along with some 70 homes, four multi-unit residential buildings, two commercial buildings, and five community buildings including the BCF and Drumheller Memorial Arena.
As a portion of the dike will be built through Centennial Park, SweetTech Engineering engineer Julia Tarnowski explained they will “try to maintain a parklike setting.” Existing pathways will also be maintained and, as part of the Downtown Area Revitalization Plan (DARP), future pathways to downtown areas will be incorporated.
It is estimated Centennial Park will be closed to the public for construction between April and the end of June 2022, and there will be temporary pathway detours during this time.
The Flood Mitigation office has been looking at various options for the portion of the dike that will run from Riverview Terrace condominiums to Schumacher’s corner due to alignment requirements and land constraints. These options included extending this section of the dike some 20 metres into the Red Deer River, installing a retaining wall some 300 metres long and over three-metres high, reducing a portion of Riverside Drive to a one lane, one-way street and reducing the retaining wall to approximately 150 metres long, or closing approximately two-blocks of Riverside Drive.
Extending the dike into the Red Deer River would have “significant environmental impacts to aquatic habitat,” this option will not be authorized by the Department of Fisheries and Oceans unless there is no other feasible alternative available.
Building a retaining wall was also not recommended as the structure would push the overall project “beyond the available budget” due to the increased costs.
Ms. Tarnowski explained the recommended option is to close a portion of Riverside Drive; this closure would extend from the baseball diamond to just beyond the intersection at Riverside Drive and 3 Ave East where Riverside Drive turns into 5 Street East. A cul-de-sac and laneway would allow local and emergency access to the properties in this area.
No retaining wall would be required for this option, which will help reduce overall costs, though some riprap will be required along this section for bank stabilization.
As this option poses impacts on the community, the Town of Drumheller and Flood Mitigation office is conducting a survey to gather any concerns this closure will have on traffic. The survey will be open for several weeks and this is “one of many conversations” regarding the proposed closure.
The survey can be found at:
https://www.surveymonkey.com/r/DowntownDrumTraffic.
