Bruce County council will not be handing over ownership of the controversial West Road.
County council rejected a request by South Bruce Peninsula council to have the portions of the West Road within their municipal boundary returned as a municipal road, and will instead move ahead in the environmental assessment process, with an eye towards possible reconstruction of the road.
The West Road is a 29 km collection of roads west of Hwy. 6 between Ferndale and Oliphant.
South Bruce Peninsula Mayor Janice Jackson was the only one of Bruce County's eight mayors to vote against retaining the West Road. She says reconstruction of the road is unnecessary and unwanted in that area.
Jackson says there's evidence that wind energy developers could use a reconstructed West Road as a corridor for wind turbine projects on the Bruce Peninsula and they are trying to avoid that.
County Highways Engineer Brian Knox says the environmental assessment has established a problem statement for the West Road and now moves into the process of identifying solutions.
"We've identified road deficiencies, and now we have to identify how we would define road improvements to accommodate those road deficiencies and there's a variety of conceptual solutions," says Knox.
He says the hope is for those conceptual solutions to be ready for a round of public meetings this summer.
