Highway 101 twinning in Nova Scotia held up over fish passage fight

Completion of the $151-million Highway 101 twinning project in Nova Scotia could be pushed back a year unless there is a decision soon on fish passage in the Avon River at Windsor, the province warned Thursday.

Transportation Minister Lloyd Hines said the project is already a couple of months behind schedule because there is no agreement on what will replace the existing causeway and an aboiteau over the river. It is the last section in the 10-kilometre twinning.

"It'll get critical as we progress into the fall. So it could push the project back a year if we're not able to get on the land, as it were," Hines said.

The highway project from Three Mile Plains to Falmouth is supposed to finish in December 2023.

The roadbed for the twinned highway is nearing the causeway.

"There are proponents there that are arguing issues that are not in our purview, which is open gates, closed gates, fish passage, all that sort of thing. All very important implications, but we want to build the highway," Hines said.

Highway 101 runs over the Avon River where the provincial Department of Agriculture operates sluice gates on a rock and earth causeway built 50 years ago.

This year, federal Fisheries Minister Bernadette Jordan ordered the provincial gates open to allow improved fish passage.

But there is no agreement between the province and DFO over what should replace the existing system when the new highway is built over the river.

The province said it has put forward a preferred option that would allow fish passage, protect homes and land from tidal waters, and maintain Lake Pisiquid, which was created by the existing aboiteau.

On the other side are First Nations, environmentalists and some local fishermen who want fish passage restored.

Hines said the twinning can still finish on time "if we can make some progress in the next 60 days and get a clear path forward."

"If it goes much beyond that, if we still don't have resolution by the time the snow flies this year, then we're probably going to lose a one-year season there," he said. "If it doesn't get done in '23, then it'll get done in '24."

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