CALGARY — Changes to Calgary’s Ring Road project in the southeast corner of the city have drawn ire from a number of local businesses, including a couple dozen trucking operations, who say the government is giving them the ‘ol ring around.

Roughly 25 trucking firms are among the newly formed, 100-member strong 84th Street SE Access Association who are taking on the Alberta government,  along with the City of Calgary  and the Municipality of Rocky View over plans to develop a transportation-industrial hub at the outskirts of Calgary, which would be integrated with the future Calgary Ring Road.

As a result, the Shephard Industrial Area was created along 84 Street SE in Calgary. The SE Calgary Ring Road will be built just east of the hub, with interchanges set for Peigan Trail, Glenmore Trail and 114 Avenue.

Members of the association are disturbed that two more interchanges — at 61 and 106 Avenues SE — have been deleted from the original plans.

Trucking companies say this isn’t
what they signed up for when they
moved closer to the proposed ring road.

"The heart of the issue is with the planned closure of the intersections along 84 Street," explains Trevor Fridfinnson, vice-president of western operations with Bison Transport.

Fridfinnson also signed on to serve as vice-president of the 84th Street SE Access Association and tells todaystrucking.com that the group just wants the province to stick to the plan they used to entice businesses to relocate to the area in the first place.

Part of the reason for building the Ring Road around Calgary was to improve traffic flow in the region, thereby reducing impact on the environment. But by deleting the two intersections from the Ring Road plan, truck traffic arriving from the south will have to pass by the industrial area and exit at Glenmore before doubling back to the terminal.

"It’s an extra eight kilometres roundtrip here at Bison and that’s a serious problem for businesses who are relying on timeliness as part of their efficiency," says Fridfinnson.

He estimates that the Bison fleet alone will accumulate an extra 1.1 million km during the course of the year if the two intersections are not inserted back into the blueprints. "As well as the time and money being wasted, there’s an environmental impact of wasting fuel by doing laps around the neighborhood," notes Fridfinnson.

The association has held a series of meeting with the region’s MLAs and local politicians and says there has been some positive feedback.

Up next is a meeting with Alberta Transport Minister Luke Ouellette in early April to discuss the concerns of the local businesses.