King Street Streetscape Redesign

For immediate release

June 18, 2008

Committee approves modified design for King Street streetscape

KITCHENER – Monday, June 16, the city’s development and technical services committee voted in favour of increasing the budget set aside for the King Street streetscape redesign project to $8.8 million, combining the city’s previous funds with the Province of Ontario’s allocation to fund the city’s original vision for the new streetscape.

The city’s portion of the funding for the project will be $5.68 million; while the remaining $3.2 million will come from the Provincial Municipal Infrastructure Investment Initiative.

The city will issue a tender for this project later this year that will ask vendors to respond with pricing options for different surface materials such as concrete pavers versus granite pavers. This will provide flexibility when city council makes a final decision on the project.

“Given the importance of this project to the overall revitalization of our downtown core, I think it’s only right that we attempt to achieve as much as we can through the redesign of the streetscape – while ensuring that we stay within our budget,” said Ward 6 Councillor Christina Weylie, chair of the development and technical services committee. “I’m very interested to see the ideas that will come out of the tender process.”

In early April 2008, in light of new information that showed the potential for the project’s cost to be $2 million to $4 million more than expected, council directed staff to pause the King Street streetscape project to complete a detailed third-party cost review.

The pause provided more time for staff to conduct a value engineering assessment that focused on determining ways to adjust the design of the project and reduce the overall cost.

Some of the features proposed for the redesign include:

- Replacement of all surface elements of King Street between Frederick and Francis streets;

- Extensive use of granite in sidewalks, curbs and crosswalks;

- New and upgraded street lighting with improved spacing incorporated throughout;

- Flexible parking delineated by removable bollards

- Stormwater infiltration planters and new transit shelters would be introduced throughout; new bike racks and benches would be installed;

- More than 100 trees would be planted

- More than 70 on-street parking spaces would be created.

"By issuing a tender that asks vendors to provide us with several pricing options for this project we will be able to find a way of completing the new streetscape to the benefit of the entire downtown," said Ward 1 Councillor John Smola.

The committee’s preferred option was one of five considered by city staff during their recent review of project costs.

Other options considered included:
- Postponing the project indefinitely;

- Undertaking a basic streetscape renewal that includes replacing surface elements and upgrading lighting ($5.3 million);

- Undertaking a streetscape renewal with the pedestrian first model in mind which would result in a design similar to the one originally proposed using lower quality materials ($7.9 million)

- Proceeding with a modified version of the original design ($6.5 million to $7.9 million)

The city’s portion of the streetscape improvements will be funded through the Economic Development Investment Fund (EDIF) and the roads resurfacing program.

A detailed breakdown of each of the options can be found at www.kitchener.ca. Construction is expected to be completed by 2010.

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For more information:

Michael May
Director of Corporate Communications and Marketing
City of Kitchener
519-741-2935