Kevin Laliberte
Editor, Smoky River Express

Okay folks, sharpen your pencils and get ready for a pop quiz. Here’s the question: When driving by an emergency vehicle or through a construction zone you should... (A) Move over as far to the left as possible and maintain the posted speed limit. (B) Slow down to 60 km/hr and be prepared to stop. (C) Come to a complete stop. If your answer is ‘B’ then give yourself a pat on the back for being correct. The rest of you... well read on because pleading ignorance, or stupidity, in these cases is certainly no defence, as one Alberta woman discovered when the legislation came into affect a couple years back. Travelling from Canmore to Calgary, she passed an RCMP cruiser with its lights flashing which had stopped another vehicle just minutes earlier. The problem, in this instance, is that she failed to realize her passing speed of 106 km/hr was in direct violation of the law which clearly stipulates that drivers must slow to 60 km/h when travelling through a construction zone or passing emergency vehicles with its lights activated. In the end, she was handed an eye-popping fine of $632. Talk about learning the hard way! This all ties into the official arrival of the 2008 road construction season in Alberta as the province prepares to pump a record $1.9 billion in the area of highway infrastructure improvements. In all, the government plans to re-pave 1,240 kilometres of highway, including 82 kilometres of widening work and 50 kilometres of new paved highway. In this neck of the woods, the Alberta government is ready to roll on a number of major highway projects in northwestern parts of the province, including areas such as Grande Prairie, Watino and Sexsmith. Major projects include: Ongoing construction on the Highway 43 Bypass at Grande Prairie. The two-lane overpass bridge for the future eastbound lanes will be completed this year at a cost of $5.3 million and the railroad overpass adjacent to Highway 43 is expected to be tendered and completed later this year. The first leg of the Grande Prairie bypass is scheduled to open to traffic following the completion of three kilometres of roadway connecting 116 Street (Range Road 63) with the overpass bridge. Land negotiations for the Highway 43 bypass right-of-way are ongoing and the roadwork is expected to begin in spring 2009. . Repaving 8.7 kilometres of Highway 43 on the eastbound and westbound lanes through the City of Grande Prairie at a cost of $11.9 million. Work will extend from the airport road to the north city limits and will be completed before the end of October. . Ongoing construction on the replacement of the Smoky River Bridge on Highway 49 near Watino at a cost of $46 million. The new bridge is scheduled to open to traffic by October 2009. . Construction will be completed on twinning Highway 2 at Sexsmith from north of Highway 59 to south of Highway 672 at a cost of $23.5 million. The new section of twinning is scheduled to open later this summer. . Deck replacement work on the Dunvegan Bridge (at a cost of $17.8 million) is continuing with the work expected to be complete in 2009. As a motorist, please remember that the fines for being one to 19 kilometres an hour over the posted limit in a construction zone are double the going rate at $6 per kilometre. And it only gets worse from there. For 20 km/hr to 30 km/hr the fine is $9 per kilometre and a whopping $14 per kilometre for up to 49 km/hr over the limit. For those caught doing 50 km/hr over the posted limit in a zone, it's a wallet-crushing $19.50 per kilometre. The bottom line, other than the obvious safety factor, is that we all have better things to do with our hard-earned income!

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