Construction company to re-pave parts of recently completed Main Street

WELLINGTON NORTH – Cox Construction will be back in Mount Forest this spring to correct issues on Main Street. 

The company resurfaced Main Street between Sligo Road and Queen Street last year, but lab testing of samples taken from the road showed deficiencies. 

This raised concerns about the road’s long-term durability and lifecycle performance, so portions of the road will be redone. 

This work is covered under warranty, so Cox Construction is responsible for all costs of the corrective work. 

The initial work cost $1.65 million, with the Ministry of Transportation of Ontario (MTO) covering almost $1.5 million and the township covering $165,171. 

Wellington North council approved an extended warranty agreement for the project during a March 9 meeting. 

Township infrastructure and engineering manager Tammy Stevenson said “the asphalt mix design is kind of like a cake recipe where different ingredients go into it to make the preferred asphalt mix based on the environment and traffic conditions. 

“The asphalt test revealed some of the parameters failed, and others that were borderline,” Stevenson said. 

“So although we don’t have 100 per cent certainty that the asphalt will fail, the quality assurance test results have some concerning factors on it.” 

The corrective work includes:

• removing and replacing all asphalt at the Durham and Main Street intersection;
• removing and replacing surface asphalt on Main Street’s north bound lane north of Wellington Street to correct surface grade irregularities and restore proper crossfall and drainage; and
• correcting low asphalt grades around maintenance holes and water valve chambers to ensure proper surface transitions, eliminate the pooling of water and improve ride quality. 

“Quality assurance testing will be undertaken during the corrective works to confirm compliance with performance requirements,” states a township report about the work. 

The township explored fully removing and replacing all of the asphalt between Sligo Road and Queen Street but decided against it because a full replacement “would have resulted in significant disruption to adjacent businesses, extended traffic impacts, potential delays to project completion and implications related to contractual coordination with the MTO.”

Councillor Steve McCabe asked if completely redoing the project would be a better option, causing “temporary pain for what I call long-term gain,” but there was no further discussion of this during the meeting.   

The warranty period for the work will be extended from two years to five, and Cox Construction will provide bonding/security to guarantee long-term performance. 

The warranty includes defined performance criteria including rutting limits, cracking thresholds and surface integrity standards. 

Cox Construction will be required to remediate (and cover the costs of) any premature failure of the defined criteria. 

“By entering into an extended warranty period and implementing a monitoring program, this would allow us to monitor the asphalt to see if there’s any asphalt failures – then the warranty period would deal with the removal and replacement of the deficiencies at that time,” Stevenson said. 

McCabe said, “I’d hate to go through all this again in a year or two even though we have a five-year guarantee.” 

Councillor Sherry Burke asked whether new installations – those planned and any potential future corrections – would look “sort of seamless the way it is now, or is it going to look more like a patch quilt when you’re done?” 

Stevenson said any sections needing replacing would be from the edge of the pavement to the centre line. 

“That’s certainly not the outcome we all hope for, but I think this is a reasonable approach to try to work through it,” said Mayor Andy Lennox. 

“Hopefully we don’t have to take any further action, but at least we will be better prepared if we do.”

Council voted unanimously in favour of the plan for remedial work and an extended warranty with Cox Construction.