A road too high: Officials scramble to fix $100,000 error

MICHAELA RODRIGUE
Nunatsiaq News

IQALUIT — Territorial and hamlet officials still won’t say who is responsible for a constructing new road in Rankin Inlet at a dangerously high elevation.

But they do know that the error will cost more than $100,000 to fix.

After a week of meetings, officials from the Nunavut government and the Hamlet of Rankin Inlet are fixing a140-meter stretch of elevated road that local residents warned had been built too high.

If the elevation of the road isn’t reduced, spring runoff could cause damage to aligning houses, officials say.

“Any time there is a chance that pooling might occur, plus Arctic conditions, you could have drainage problems,” said Robert Janes, Rankin Inlet’s senior administrative officer.

Drainage problems could cause land to shift and structural damage to the homes that line the road, known as “Road C.”

Road C is part of a new 100-lot, $2-million subdivision under development in Rankin Inlet. Three weeks ago, residents began to complain that the road sits at least two meters higher than other roads in town.

“The height of the road increases dramatically and it becomes very unsettling to the residents down there,” Janes said.

Janes believes the road was elevated to give sewage and water pipes enough of a slope. But the unusually elevated road may cause run-off problems for local homeowners.

Government and hamlet officials still won’t say who made the final decision to raise the road, but they expect that it will cost more than $100,000 to repair the mistake.

The hamlet now plans to lower the utilidor pipes further into the ground. The change will cut the elevation of the road by about a half, and would eliminate any drainage problems, Janes said.

Janes doesn’t know exactly who will pay the final fix-up bill.

The hamlet is paying part of the cost of developing the new subdivision through a bank loan, while the Nunavut government is also paying part of it.

Janes said the extra costs created by the error shouldn’t force a hike in lease rates for the lots, and he expects that work will be done within a week.

The entire subdivision should have water and sewage after next year, Janes said.