London Ontario - It's a dot of light at the end of a very long tunnel for Adelaide Street drivers growing weary of long waits for passing freight trains.
 
City staff have released their preferred design for an underpass that will route Adelaide's four lanes of traffic beneath the tracks and forever eliminate a long-standing irritant for drivers stuck waiting at the busy rail crossing.
 
Members of the city's Civic Works committee gave early approval yesterday for the underpass design.
 
Here are some of the details:
 
How much will it cost?
 
$58 million.
 
That includes $10 million for roadwork, $8.8 million for new storm sewers and pump station, and $9.8 million for property acquisition.
 
But CP Will Cover a Chunk of That Right?
 
More like a slice.
 
A city report says "cost-sharing is anticipated with Canadian Pacific Railway (CP) at 15 percent of the total project cost."
 
That means CP is set to pay just under $9 million.
 
Coun. Jesse Helmer says the city is unlikely to get more from the railway.
 
"It's pretty standard to have something like that, 15 percent," he said.
 
"From an operations perspective, I don't think the underpass is improving things for the railway. There are some pretty significant impacts on the railway."
 
What Will it Look Like?
 
The grade of Adelaide Street will drop north of Central Avenue and south of Pall Mall Street.
 
The bridge itself will have a steel girder design not unlike the new train bridge over Wharncliffe Road north of Oxford Street.
 
The design includes a four-metre wide multi-use path beside each curb lane.
 
The idea is to provide room for both bikes and pedestrians.
 
How Will the Street Change?
 
There will be some property acquisitions to accommodate the wider street and drop in grade.
 
City engineers figure they'll need 17 expropriations, most are small "slivers" of land but the car wash and gas station on the west side of Adelaide and south of the tracks will likely have to go to make way for a pumping station.
 
Helmer said the land acquisitions are unavoidable.
 
"It will either be a voluntary transaction, where we buy the properties and in some cases we'll have to go to expropriation," he said.
 
"But even in that case, people are fairly compensated for the impacts on their properties."
 
Also, the west side of Central Avenue will be re-configured so that it's aligned with the section east of Adelaide.
 
Finally, drivers heading north on Adelaide won't be able to turn left onto Pall Mall Street.
 
Instead, Pall Mall will become right turn in, right turn out only.
 
How Can They Build This and Keep Adelaide Open?
 
With some difficulty.
 
But mainly by using a temporary, north-south, two-lane detour road that will run just east of Adelaide while the underpass is built.
 
The detour route will cut into the McMahen Park but the park edge will be spruced up after the underpass is built and the detour route comes out.
 
Despite the detour route, drivers can expect it will be slow going through the construction zone.
 
So When Will it be Done?
 
Assuming everything stays on track construction will start in 2021 and take two years.
 
It's a long time to wait but staff say this is a complicated project on one of London's busiest streets.
 
Is All This Cost and Hassle Really Necessary?
 
City staff make their case this way.
 
About 25,000 cars a day use Adelaide.
 
There are between 25 to 43 blockages a day at the crossing.
 
Worse, on average about eight of those blockages last minutes or longer.
 
Part of the problem is that CP has a marshalling yard just east of Adelaide, where trains are switched (shunted) as they are built up and broken down.
 
Sometimes this switching means trains move back and forth over the crossing without clearing it.
 
"Anytime there's shunting going on, it's so slow," said Helmer.
 
"It can be maddening for people watching the train go back and forth. Frustrated drivers often try to dart down side streets and there have been reports of pedestrians jumping between railcars when trains sit in place (don't do that by the way, it's illegal and dangerous). An overpass would solve a lot of this."
 
Only four years ago the project was slated to start in 2031, but with crossing delays getting worse the city moved up the timeline to the current projected 2021 start date.
 
"This is an expensive project for the city but it's also necessary, I'm glad we're doing it earlier," said Helmer.
 
Andrew Lupton.