Ontario Construction News staff writer
About 5,000 trees in the Town of Erin, northwest of Toronto, will be cut from the Elora Cataract Trailway to clear the way for sewer construction. According to a construction notice from Dig Erin, tree and vegetation removal will start the week of Sept. 11 and will continue for six to eight weeks.
Work will be done by Nabolsy Contracting/Snow Brothers Contracting.
Sewer installation work will begin immediately and is anticipated to last for approximately 20 months. Following completion of the sewer installation, the trail will be restored with new trees and vegetation.
Town officials say about 5,000 trees will be removed, with plans to re-plant 20,000 trees once construction is complete.
Work is needed to support the Hillsburgh and Erin Village communities by removing the reliance on existing septic systems while creating opportunities for growth within the town over the next two decades,” said the construction notice.
Due to the open-cut construction method required for the installation of the gravity sewer along the trail, the notice states that vegetation removal along the pipe’s alignment was deemed necessary by the town’s contractor in order to replace and upgrade 13 culverts crossing the trail.
“Tree removals have been minimized to the greatest possible extent,” the construction notice states. “Once the gravity sewer installation is completed, the trail pathway will be restored to a better condition and all trees that are removed will be replaced with approximately four times as many new trees.”