Dignitaries gathered on Thursday to celebrate the completion of the Cestar Dock at Sarnia Harbour.
City officials were joined by representatives from the County of Lambton, Lambton College, and the Cestar Group - which provided $4 million to the project - for a ribbon cutting ceremony at the site at the foot of Exmouth Street.
Oversize Load Corridor (OLC) Project Manager Lyle Johnson said the finished dock represents a substantial milestone in the City of Sarnia and County of Lambton endeavor.
"It took a village to make this happen," Johnson said. "It's been several years to get us here and the continuous support from SLIA (Sarnia Lambton Industrial Alliance), SLEP (Sarnia Lambton Economic Partnership), the industrial communities, the sponsors Cestar College, the National Trade Corridor Fund, and Southwestern Ontario Development Fund... It wouldn't have happened without all of the contributions from those folks. It was a long haul, but we got here."
Construction of the $8.8 million dock expansion at the north slip took longer than expected. At the groundbreaking in June 2023, officials expected the work would be done by the end 2023.
"We had some delays with final permitting that could have been expected but wasn't, so that took us a little longer than we'd expected. But, the end result has been a great facility here to last for a lifetime," Johnson said.
Johnson said the dock is already being put to good use, accommodating larger vessels and roll-on-roll-off loading of large items.
"As early as May of this year, before we finished the pavement and finished the final details, our first ship was docked for maintenance and there's been somewhere around 20 to date docked," he said. "There's multiple ship requests that have come in for the fall and the winter to use the facility now that it's here."
The $17 million OLC project mitigates traffic impacts from oversized loads moving through the city, by utilizing various streets including: Exmouth Street, Murphy Road, Confederation Street, Highway 40, Blackwell Sideroad, Churchill Road, and Plank Road.
"All of the road modifications, traffic lights and utilities, between here and Petrolia Line basically are finished. There was one section of the project between Petrolia Line and Brigden that's not going to be finished due to budget constraints. So, that's the only section that would be looked at in the future depending on need and requirements," Johnson said.
As part of the OLC project, 230 utility crossings were buried, 2.8 km of Blackwell Side Road was resurfaced and 22 rotating traffic signal bases were installed.
Cestar’s Chief Operating Officer Adrian Sharma snipped the ribbon to mark the dock's official opening.
“Even though Cestar College physically exists in Toronto, we feel very attached to the community and the people of Sarnia through our partnership with Lambton College, so we are thrilled to see that this facility will live on in the community as a meaningful reminder of our partnership,” Sharma said.
The wheels started moving on the OLC project in 2018 when Lambton County Council committed $1.2 million to start it.
