Surrey council approves 72 Avenue expansion project

Surrey city council have given the go ahead to expand a section of 72 Avenue. (Courtesy: City of Surrey)

Surrey council has given the green light to an extension project for 72 Avenue.

In a meeting Monday evening, council voted unanimously to expand the section of the road between 152 Street and Highway 15 to include four-lane roads and shoulders on both sides.

“People drive cars in our city and they will for the foreseeable future. We need this infrastructure,” said Surrey Mayor Brenda Locke.

“Surrey is larger than Vancouver, Burnaby, Richmond put together. Getting around is challenging,” she said.

Council members agreed the expansion would improve traffic flow and reduce congestion along 72 Avenue, and its parallel routes of Highway 10, 64 Avenue, and 88 Avenue. The increased infrastructure will also support Surrey’s rapid population growth, council said.

“Surrey is growing at the rate of 1,200 and 1,500 people every month. The road networks in Surrey are very difficult to navigate and there are very few of them,” said Coun. Linda Annis.

Currently, 72 Avenue closes into a dead end east of 152 Street. The extension would require the road to be cut through farmland, inciting concerns among local farmers who are worried construction would lead to drainage issues and affect the accessibility to their homes.

Annis said the city has been consulting with the farmers living and working in that area. “It’s absolutely critical that we are partners on this project,” she said.

Other residents in the area have offered their support to the project, with 74 per cent of the more than 2,400 residents surveyed by the city saying they are happy with the design of the new corridor.

In the meeting Monday evening, Locke assured the project would be carried out in “a couple of phases” to keep affects to traffic at a minimum and not cause too much hindrance to commuters.

The first phase would tackle the section between 140 Street and 152 Street, which is already “really congested,” and then 152 Street through the farmland to 176 Street, before tending to the area between 184 Street and 196 Street, she said.

“This is great news for the city of Surrey. We have a huge transportation issue here, it takes so long for cars to go east-west,” she said.

Construction for the project, set to be the city’s most costly to date at $150 million, is anticipated to start in the spring next year and will continue into 2026.

The final phase is estimated to be completed in the spring of 2026.