An historical project that was never completed took a step forward during a special meeting of Cobourg council on Wednesday afternoon.
Council voted to authorize staff to execute a cost sharing agreement with the developer of the lot at 202 Second Street to advance the Midtown Creek Culvert Realignment capital project.
The culvert currently runs from Covert Street under the parking lot and downtown buildings on King Street, the lot behind those buildings between Second and First streets and past Albert Street into Rotary Harbourfront Park.
The project would benefit the developer by fully removing the culvert from the land for its housing project. In the report presented to council, the developer would contribute $350,000 toward the project as part of the cost-sharing agreement. The town’s portion is expected to be in the $1,500,000 to $2,000,000 range, though the numbers are preliminary with design work and cost estimates not expected to be completed until the fall.
The culvert realignment was originally tendered in 2000, but only a portion of the project – on Second Street – was completed due to budgetary reasons.
The proposed realignment would shift the culvert to the Henley Arcade area and connect to the existing culvert installed in 2000 on Second Street. Then a new section of culvert would be installed to extend from the bottom of Second Street to the existing culvert along Albert Street.
“It’s very good timing for both the town and for the developer to proceed with this work and the developer has been doing a great job at obtaining an engineering consultant that is currently doing the field investigation…so we are proceeding in good faith with the design of the creek realignment and now this is just the final touch to ensure that the cost-sharing agreement is understood on both sides in case of things change in the future and so that the developer knows where the town sits as far as a commitment to proceeding with this capital work,” said Cobourg’s Director of Public Works Laurie Wills, adding the project will still need to be considered during 2026 budget deliberations.
Wills noted that as part of the ongoing field investigations, Henley Arcade will be closed to pedestrian access Monday and Tuesday next week.
Deputy Mayor Nicole Beatty, who is council’s rep and the current chair of the Downtown Business Improvement Area, asked what impact there could be to businesses and how to communicate that information with members.
“Definitely that’s on our list to do when we have further information,” Wills said. “We’re still in the field investigation stages right now and then they will progress to the detailed design and once we understand what’s in the design we’ll have to establish a construction schedule, which is complicated because we know it will be impacting the downtown and we want to ensure we are not doing it in the highest point of tourism and businesses.
At the same time, works within a creek are best done in shoulder seasons, we’ll say in the fall when there’s low flow so it works out well that it would likely be a fall type of project.”
Councillor Brian Darling asked about sealing the existing portion of the culvert that will no longer be used and if it will be required to dig up King Street as well as removal of the existing structure under the Cover Street parking lot.
Darling said he read a story out of Toronto about abandoned pipes and culverts becoming a nesting ground for rodents.
“I just wanted to make sure that we’re looking at those perspectives to make sure that part of this project is not to give us more problems down the road,” he said.
Wills said “this is part of the detailed design and those types of details would be part of our communications back to the DBIA members and the owners of those buildings and as well, considering Covert Street, of course what the realignment of the channel looks like through the Covert Street parking lot and what happens to that existing culvert that remains there.”
The approved motion also states staff recommend the capital project be considered for approval in the 2026 capital budget upon receipt of a construction cost estimate this fall.
Author: Pete Fisher
Has been a photojournalist for over 30-years and have been honoured to win numerous awards for photography and writing over the years. Best selling author for the book Highway of Heroes - True Patriot Love
