Wheatley Update November 7

Media Release

November 07, 2022

Elm Street and Foster Street to be Reopened Tuesday, November 8

Elm Street between Erie Street North and Little Street and Foster Street between Erie Street North and Victoria in Wheatley will reopen for traffic Tuesday, November 8 by the end of the day.

Ryan Brown, Chatham-Kent Director of Public Works, said the provincial drilling contracting firm has completed its work and demobilized from the site, providing the ability to open the roadway.

Security personnel will remain at the site of the reduced evacuation zone on a 24-hour basis.

The municipality is planning to implement a scrubber system to capture any H2S gas at the site from the monitoring well during the interim monitoring period of the well. This could lead to a further reduction of the evacuation zone and the reopening of Erie Street North between Elm and Talbot Road. The current flare stack onsite will remain as a backup system for the time being as an additional safety measure.

Options to allow pedestrian traffic along the street are being discussed as part of that plan.

Brown said reopening the streets will provide a much improved east-west traffic flow through the community.