Parts of Saskatchewan highway 322 to be paved

After a summer of people driving on a highway some described as like driving on a washboard, part of highway 322 is getting paved.

Work on the five kilometre section from highway 20 to Silton begins on Wednesday. The work will grade and pave the stretch to bring it up to tourism standards. The Ministry of Highways said it will cost $2.3 million, and it’s hoping the work will be done by the fall.

Some minor repairs were done at the beginning of the camping season, and even the Minister for Highways agreed highways 220 and 322 were bad.

But there’s at least one person who thinks more should be done. David Williams has a cabin at Yules Bay, near Rowan’s Ravine provincial park.

 “The road is dangerous, it’s not that it’s just a bad road, it’s dangerous. I’m just amazed that somebody hasn’t had some kind of an accident on there yet,” he said.

 The highways to get to his cabin are 322, and 220, and he said both are in terrible shape. He’s resorted to taking grid roads to cut down the wear on his truck.

 Williams said a friend took his camper onto the highway and it shook the oven door loose.

 “That highway should be fixed. All the highways should be fixed.”

 That portion that is going to be paved gets the most traffic, and the province said it had to prioritize work because of time and budget constraints, so that portion is the only one on the books right now. A spokesperson said it would cost tens of millions of dollars to do the entirety of both highways.

 Williams said he thinks the province should find the money.

 “I realize that things are tight and everything else, but you gotta fix the highway, man, that’s an important thing.”

 The province said it has been working with stakeholders to talk about their long-term needs, but it has no specific plans for work on the other parts of those two highways at this time.