A plan has now been put in place by the Ministry of Highways and Infrastructure (MHI) to fix Highway 5 west of Humboldt. A section of the highway approximately seven kilometres west of Humboldt has been closed due to flooding for two weeks. In June, MHI took precautionary measures and installed rip rap, to control erosion and sandbags to stop the flooding, but the water level eventually rose to cover the highway with just under a foot of water."The area that's flooding is basically a slough," said Doug Wakabayashi from MHI.At first, they were unsure of how to fix the problem, and were hoping the rain would stop and the water would begin to evaporate.Wakabayashi said they now have a plan to fix the highway so it can be re-opened."What we're going to do is raise the road," said Wakabayashi.The plan has both short term and long term solutions to the problem.The short term plan is to raise the road about one and a half to two feet, said Wakabayashi. That work should only take a week to 10 days to complete.On July 9, they started hauling in gravel to raise the road. The goal of the short term fix is just to get the highway back open. "Once that work is done, the highway will re-open," said Wakabayashi.The long term plan is a little more complex and will take until the fall to complete. "The highway (now) has a trapezoid shape," said Wakabayashi.The highway workers will be restoring the proper shape to the highway, as well as going back in and widening the surface of the road. There were unofficial reports the department would be pumping the water out of the slough to lower the water level. If the Ministry would have decided to pump the water out, it could have cost upwards of $500,000, according to unofficial reports.
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