Phase 3 of Niagara Street Now project has officially begun. Vision Niagara president Barbara Rowe has confirmed that the work has commenced, and we can expect a fairly aggressive work schedule moving forward. This leg of the construction work goes from Hampshire to Forest – the plantings will be done in the fall.
Additionally, the Phase 4A project has a low bidder (possibly same contractor) and is apparently in process, which means that once Phase 3 is complete, the next phase should begin, starting at Forest and moving toward Ontario. Rowe says that the process should also be smoother and quicker, if the same contractor wins the bid, which looks to be the case.
As for the plans, nothing has significantly changed since the time we released the renderings (when Phase 3 went to bid) back in November of 2017 (see info and renderings here).
“It’s thrilling to see all if the construction vehicles,” said Rowe. “You can walk along the street and see where everything is going. We desperately needed this – we first started talking about this ten years ago. While it took a long time, the delays did mean that we got a chance to turn it into a much greater project than it would have been without the delay. We can thank now-retired DPW engineer John Bidell – he was one of our champions. And also Julie Barrett O’Neill, who was with the Sewer Authority at the time – she got the street some instrumental grants.”