The topic of putting in a new sidewalk on Perkins Street was brought up during Monday night’s city council meeting in Estevan.

That came from a letter sent by resident Haley Weber to council, who asked for the addition to be added to the residential area between 2nd and 3rd Avenue to the corner of Perkins Street and McDonald Road.

She wanted to see the change because she stated she'd seen many pedestrians walking down the street, including children walking to bus stops.

That sidewalk would be located on the south side of the road, with Weber saying that it could be connected to the walking path.

Mayor Roy Ludwig stated that the usual cost of a sidewalk outside of the city's normal project scale to be split at 80 per cent of the cost to the homeowner and 20 per cent of the cost to the city, with an estimated cost (before being tendered) of $140,000-$170,000.

Councilor Shelly Veroba talked about the street and her experience with the traffic.

"This is a very busy street and it's increased in business with truck traffic, mainly because the city has decided that that should be a truck route. I live on Jubilee Place, which is just off 4th Avenue, and I see the amount of trucks that come out. I also see these young kids trying to walk on the grassy areas and then come winter they're walking through snowbanks, trying to get to the bus stop, or even just trying to get over to the Hillcrest School."

Veroba hoped that the city could find the budget to put in the sidewalk, while also hoping that the right people could be engaged.

"The other thing though, I would like to see is that we talk with the homeowners and the condominium and the apartments to make sure that they're in favor of clearing those sidewalks or at least willing to participate, and then see if that suffices for now until the next year's budget, the new Council and see if there's room or need for any more sidewalks." 

She then suggested that instead of deliberating on the subject now, they instead move that to the budget meeting.

Councilor Rebecca Foord agreed with that while wanting some more thoughts from the community.

"I'd also like a little bit of community engagement on this. Is it possible for the marketing group to maybe just create an online survey that we put on our Facebook page for anybody in the community who uses that area just to say yes, I would be in favor of this or no, just to kind of get a little bit more pulse of the area? I don't go by that way very often, so I'm not sure, but it would be nice to know what other people think." 

Council then accepted the motion to move the conversation to the budget meeting.

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