WITH STIMULUS FUNDS delivered, massive city building projects are getting underway with great fanfare. The Union Station overhaul finally has the go- ahead. For drivers, a new route out of downtown opens up when the extension of Simcoe Street to Lakeshore Boulevard will be unveiled. And all three orders of government will be fighting for the shovel, and the credit, when the Sheppard LRT line begins construction.

An equally big project began this past winter without much fanfare, but is just as important as any. The first of 30 projects to improve North York’s storm water management began in Don Valley East in a ravine near Sheppard Avenue East and Leslie Street. Nearing completion as the summer closes, the project replaced a washed out storm water culvert and the water infrastructure leading to the culvert. The new sewer pipes and culvert are now designed to deal with 100-year storms like the one North Yorkers experienced in 2005.

We’ve endured the inconvenience of contractors taking over our streets to flush water mains or reline our sewers. But 2009 will go down in history for the residents surrounding the culvert project at Sheppard and Leslie as ‘the summer to forget,’ due to the invasive nature of the project. A review of the project is now required.

The greatly improved culvert is now fully installed. It absorbed all of the extreme rains of Aug. 8 and 9. But the city owes it to the remaining residents waiting for basement flooding mitigation projects to conduct a thorough review of the first job done. I will be requesting this review in September. Future contracts must include more safeguards and greater sensitivity to the families and children who live alongside these projects.