Surrey’s 84th Avenue extension design approved by council

SURREY (NEWS 1130) – Surrey is another step closer to extending 84th Avenue, but those who oppose the project say the fight isn’t over.

City council has voted on an engineering design to connect 84th Avenue between King George Boulevard and 140th Street in Newton, on the south end of Bear Creek Park.

Coun. Doug Elford says the extension is needed for an east-west connection.

“Many community people approached me and said they were tired of sitting in 20-minute lineups to go two blocks, and so they need some relief and a sense of our congestion, but also we need to take some pressure off of 88th for safety reasons,” he said, adding with SkyTrain and rapid transit coming to Surrey, the city needs routes east and west.

“This road would eventually connect Nordel Way in Delta all the way to Fraser Highway.”

However, Sebastian Sajda with the Friends of Bear Creek Park believes the project can and must still be stopped.

“There’s federally protected wildlife there; the great blue heron. There’s two red listed southern bearing creeks, I don’t think that this is a done deal at all,” he said. “I’m curious how they’re going to design a road that doesn’t impact these very sensitive ecosystems.”

His group has been organizing protests every Wednesday and Sunday for the past two months, and he says membership and interest has grown.

“As part of the public consultation process you know the city is supposed to reach out to the citizens, and let them know, and they really failed to do that, they didn’t read anything in the local newspaper,” he said.

He says the problem intersection of 88th and King George identified by the City can be fixed without the need for an extension through the park.

“There is a recommendation in the city’s Vision Zero plan, which is the plan to reduce accidents to zero in the city, to install a fully-protected left turn signal there,” he said. “So we’re just asking the city actually do that at 88th and King George and see accidents plummet.”

Elford contends the road is not going through the park.

“If it was truly going to the park, that would require a bylaw, a separate process and, and it’s not,” Elford said, adding the extension will come with improved pathways and cycling infrastructure. “We’re going to enhance the area of land or that’s been totally unused for many many years. And that’s going to provide more public access and allow for people to enjoy more parts of the area.”

Now that the engineering design has been approved, Elford says construction could begin as early as this year, but no timeline has been set.