Some townhouse residents living near the new Evans Road Connector got the safety barrier they requested from city officials.

The newly opened slip road off Evans Road leading to the eastbound section of Luckakuck Way now sports a concrete vehicle barrier that was cast and installed on-site.

“Hopefully this will make the neighbours happier and safer, and that the project will be good for the entire town,” said Mayor Sharon Gaetz.

The mayor said she drove down the new slip road that diverts traffic eastbound off Evans Road to get a look at the concrete vehicle barrier requested by the residents.

She underlined that city officials also offered the residents of Springfield Place a privacy fence, but they declined that part of the offer in writing.

Resident Pattie Norris explained what some of the residents really wanted was for the road to be lower than the second-storey of their townhouse complex.

“We know that won’t happen,” she told The Progress. “But the barrier is better than nothing.”

The strata residents contacted the newspaper a few weeks ago when the road was almost completed. They expressed the fear that a vehicle could leave the elevated slip road and hit their property or land in their backyard, if a barrier was not installed.

The Evans Road Connector and Interchange project has a $50-million pricetag, including all the land acquisition and road construction.

“The good news is that everything is on-time and on-budget for this very significant project,” Mayor Gaetz said. The Evans Road Connector is set to open by next spring.

The slip roads connected to the project opened on July 2. The slip roads are expected to provide “limited movement” between Luckakuck Way and Evans Road, according to the city website, and there is no southbound access to Evans from the westbound on Luckakuck Way. For more details, or a look at the plans, check out www.chilliwack.com and click on the link to the Evans Road Connector project.

Norris said the residents are still waiting for a hand railing to be installed as well. They turned thumbs-down to the privacy fencing option because of how it would impact their views.

“It would have devalued our properties even more,” she said. “We would have lost our view of Chilliwack Mountain.”

jfeinberg@theprogress.com