Cost over-runs plague K&P Trail build

Jeff Green | Feb 05, 2014

It cost $190,000 more than had been budgeted to complete the K&P Trail section between the trail head at the south end of Harrowsmith and Craig Road, just north of Verona.

Frontenac County Manager of Economic Development, Anne Marie Young, brought the news to a Frontenac County budget meeting last Wednesday, January 30.

In her detailed report to Council, Young outlined how the cost of a new deck for the walking bridge of Hardwood Creek was one of the factors, as were delays resulting from what she called “access problems”. The latter was a reference to the difficulties encountered over a piece of land that needed to be acquired from Bob Leonard of Hartington, which led to an expropriation process.

More significant yet were the added costs resulting from the fact that the additional section ended up being 11.4 kilometres, 1.8 kilometres longer than had been estimated, and there were unexpected problems with culverts at various points along the way.

The on site work for the project was provided by a member of the public works department of South Frontenac Township. The reality of the over-runs became clear late in the fall of last year, as the construction window for the year was waning and the project was at a critical phase, according to Young.

“As the need and requests for culverts, geo-textile, etc. came forth and with the project then reaching a crucial and controversial part of the trails, the project lead felt it vital to the timeliness of the project, and fearing further delays to obtain authorization for cost over-runs, agreed verbally to the requests. This was undertaken outside of the requirements of the Procurement Policy [of the County]. The full impact of these cost over-runs became evident with the final invoice received in January, 2014,” she wrote.

In the end the project, which was budgeted at $518,000, cost $710,000. In order to come up with the $518,000 that was budgeted, Frontenac County provided $350,000 (taken from a federal gas tax rebate) and grants from private sources and the Trans-Canada Trail were to cover the rest.

A request was sent to the Trans-Canada Trail to cover all or part of the overage, but if that application is not successful, the county will be on the hook for the $191,000.

“Lots of good things happened with the trail, but I want to express the concern that we were not informed while this was happening,” said Frontenac Islands Mayor Dennis Doyle.

Doyle then suggested that the contractor be approached to see if there is any way the invoice can be modified. “I think we would have approved these expenditures. The thing to do now is to take the extra money off what we spend on the trail this year,” he added.

South Frontenac Mayor Gary Davison agreed. “Essentially we did $190,000 more than we planned in 2014 and we will do $190,000 less in 2014.”

It was suggested that the next phase of the trail, from Craig Road to White Lake Road in Central Frontenac, which is scheduled for completion in 2014, be done with the services of a project manager to guard against over-runs.

Anne Marie Young expressed confidence that even with a decrease in the budget, the trail can be extended to White Lake Road this year.

“The goal of this trail is to get to Sharbot Lake and meet the Trans-Canada Trail,” she added.

“When they are built properly trails are a big business,” said Central Frontenac Mayor Janet Gutowski.

“We are going to have to look at avenues of funding for this other than federal gas tax,” said Gary Davison. “We all want to build this trail but at what cost?”