Rail safety
Fencing planned to improve safety around St. Albert's railroad tracks is slated to start going up this month.
A portion of the first phase of construction will take place in Lions Park and Morgan Park. The city is asking residents to follow all construction signage and allow crews space to work.
Construction is expected to wrap up by March 2019, as long as the weather cooperates.
The project to fence areas of the railway across St. Albert was approved at $964,500, with that cost subsidized by a $500,000 provincial grant. In January, city council agreed to put another $200,000 toward the project after tenders came in higher than expected.
St. Albert has around 8.3 kilometres of railway lines that run through the city and around four trains pass through per day. The entire rail line won’t be fenced, just the portions that see the most signs of trespassing.The city plans to have all of the fencing installed by the end of 2019.
MDP open house
The city is giving residents another opportunity to give feedback on several proposals for St. Albert's Municipal Development Plan (MDP).
On March 20 from 5:30 p.m. to 8 p.m. at the St. Albert Curling Club, the city will be hosting a public open house where residents can explore three scenarios and draft goals for the new foundational planning document.
The city kicked off its planned rewrite of the MDP in November with a two-day summit, which included inspirational speeches, open houses and summit workshops. The city collected feedback at some of those, and resident comments will be used for the rewrite.
Around 60 residents and stakeholders attended the summit workshops to give feedback.
The MDP is the foundational planning document for the city, and other documents – including area structure plans – are built off of it. St. Albert has to have its MDP updated by October 2020 in order to satisfy a requirement from the Edmonton Metropolitan Region Board's new growth plan, which was approved in October.
The rewrite is expected to cost a total of $1,094,400.
Water deal
The city has passed a 20-year-long agreement with EPCOR for the city’s water supply. The deal is to replace the previous 20-year deal, which expired last year.
The cost of water in bulk is not expected to change under the new agreement and will stay at around $6 million per year.
