Mission plots a $50 million link to a new development

The City of Mission is plotting a new $50 million bridge and road to connect incoming residents of its new Silverdale neighbourhoods with the rest of the city.

Officials will soon start planning where exactly the road will go. And while construction isn’t expected to start anytime soon, when it does begin, it will kick off one of the biggest road infrastructure projects in Mission’s recent history.

The Silverdale Connector, as it has been tentatively called by the city, is closely tied to the development of Silverdale, a sprawling hillside area just to the west of Mission’s core. The city has a plan that will see around tens of thousands of homes built in the area over the coming decades. It’s a massive area expected to double the population of Mission (currently just over 41,000).

The area and plan have elements that are similar to that for Abbotsford’s McKee Peak area on Sumas Mountain. The Silverdale area has been eyed for growth for decades, though the details and the urgency have evolved over time. Ownership of the land has also evolved, with a single development company controlling more than 700 of the 3,440 acres of land in Silverdale eyed for building.

To pave the way for development and deal with the complexities it will present, the city has broken the area into three chunks for planning purposes. The first plan, for a central 1,800-acre chunk of the area, was finalized last year.

The plans deal with a whole range of issues, from what type of homes will get built where to what areas will be reserved for parks, schools, and greenspace. It also considers all the infrastructure that will be needed.

Obviously new roads will be needed for the new neighbourhoods. And those smaller roads will also need their own feeder roads.

Some denser forms of housing—townhome complexes and a few apartments—will be built in Silverdale, and commercial centres and new schools are also planned. But in an echo of sprawling neighbourhoods built decades ago, most residents seem likely to work and shop elsewhere. That will require planners to find a way to funnel new residents and their cars into Mission and back home.

Hence the connector.

At the moment, Silverdale is comprised of a few huge chunks of forested land, along with a buch of acreages. The area is not far from the rest of Mission. But there are only a couple roads between it and Cedar Valley—the nearest neighbourhood at the north end of town. And from what will be “central” Silverdale, there is no direct route at all.

That’s because of Silverdale Creek, a modest watercourse flowing from North Mission all the way to the Fraser. The creek is tucked in a winding gulley of its own creation, and only a couple east-west roads cross it—Highway 7 to the south, and Keystone Avenue in the north. (Wren Street also crosses it in a north-south direction.)

A variety of Silverdale planning documents have recognized that the city needs a new route that bridges Silverdale Creek and provies a more direct connection between the neighbourhoods that will be constructed and the rest of town.

Such a connector would be two lanes wide and would need to ferry up to 650 cars each hour in one direction at peak hours. Without such a road, Wren Street, Keystone Avenue, and Highway 7 would have to carry tens of thousands of commuters.

On first glance, the most obvious candidate for a connection would be extending Turnbridge Avenue to Olson Avenue, but other candidates exist and city documents from 2019 suggest planners have been eyeing a connection to the south between Cherry Avenue and Grove Avenue.

A 2019 plan for Cedar Valley’s infrastructure says that “a future extension of Cherry Ave west across Silverdale Creek is currently in the conceptual planning stage.” More recent statements suggest that option may not be confirmed yet.

A Mission spokesperson said the city does not currently have a design or preferred route. But work to figure that out will begin soon, with the city budgeting $145,000 to come up with a conceptual road design for the connector. Once that work starts, officials say the public will have a chance to provide input.

The city’s new transportation plan declared that study would evaluate “a number of factors, such as environmental impacts, geotechnical concerns, land and construction costs, and property impacts.”

Mayor Paul Horn said this week that “we are currently looking at what is the most reasonable option from an engineering and cost perspective.”

While planning has begun, actual construction is unlikely to begin very soon. The city has previously said that its construction will be driven by development activity, and most of that has yet to commence. The reliance on development activity comes, in part, because the city isn’t expecting current taxpayers to pay for the project’s large cost. Instead, Mission expects development cost charges—money paid by builders to cover the cost of providing services and infrastructure for new homes—to cover the project’s entire budget.

Mission’s recently completed transportation plan roughly estimated the connector’s cost at $50 million. But that figure was only a rough guess by staff. The actual cost will obviously be heavily dependent both on the route that is selected and when construction actually would start.

The connector is currently defined as a “long-term” project, with a time range pegged at anywhere between 10 and 30 years from now.

Still, Mayor Paul Horn said Monday that he was happy to see planning moving forward, given residents’ concerns about potential east-west traffic issues.

“We are not interested in an approach that does not include a mid-town crossing. Having everyone go to the highway or having everyone go to Dewdney Trunk Road or Keystone are not options.”