Township approves study for retaining wall

By Darrell Ziegler

At its meeting on December 4 in Ripley, council agreed to have a study done by Golder Associates Ltd. for a Slope Stability Assessment of the retaining wall behind St. Luke’s Anglican Church cemetery in Point Clark.

The cost for the study is about $16,000 and will take about six-weeks to complete. The cost will come out of the 2007 budget.

At an earlier meeting, on Oct. 2, council was told that repairs to the dilapidated Pine River retaining wall securing the cemetery bank behind St. Luke’s Anglican Church in Point Clark could cost upwards of $300,000.

Councillor Jim Hanna and Anne Eadie met with officials from the Saugeen Valley Conservation Authority (SVCA) on site September 27 to discuss the problem and possible solutions.

Jim Coffey, along with his associates from Saugeen Valley, inspected the site and will be preparing a full report for council.

He said at the time, that it was possible that two-metre blocks be placed along the bank, with smaller ones behind, rather than a large, steel wall. He said before any construction, municipal environmental assessment would be needed.

If that route were taken, Coffey estimated the cost to be about $200,000 to $250,000. Nothing will be known until the inspector and Saugeen Valley make their reports and suggest solutions.

That study is now under way.

Councillor Jim Hanna said at the earlier meeting that he hopes it could be something less than a full engineering solution, with environmental assessment and public meetings. “If it goes that way, we’re looking at $300,000. I was hoping on a cheaper solution,” he said. “We’re looking at a major project.”

The retaining wall fell into the river about a year and a half ago and has since been pulled from the water and held upright by two steel cables fastened to cedar trees. For over a year, the two trees have been all that’s holding the wall in place.

Many historic head stones are within a few feet of the bank.

In the past, council has been unsure as to who’s responsibility it was to repair the wall and who actually built it. Some councillors thought that if the township did not build the wall, it was not the township’s responsibility to fix it.

Councillor Jim Hanna told council in October, “It falls on the township fix it. To do nothing would be irresponsible. The bank has slumped since spring. We’ll likely have a chunk missing by next spring.”

Council was also hoping Saugeen Valley would help share the cost of the repairs, but that will not be the case.

At a meeting in May between Coffey, representatives from the township and wardens of St. Luke’s, Coffey said that it was unlikely funding to repair the problem would be available from Saugeen Valley and that the Township should look into the option of COMRIF funding.

Hanna said that Saugeen Valley is now hoping there is a survey of the area available and that they are looking for any other physical information on the bank, to help with its restoration.

“They want to know if the church, or any members of the community, have any old photos of the bank,” he said. “Anything like that would be helpful.”

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