City crews say major rock scaling work along Ord Road on the North Shore is expected to be completed this week.

Work began in January, as Capital Projects Manager Darren Crundwell says about 4,000 cubic metres of rock is being blasted away, roughly enough to fill two full-sized swimming pools.

“Had a few things at the start that we needed to look at just with respect to how much rock we were taking down. But everything generally went according to plan,” he said. “It’s going well, it’s almost done.”

Crundwell says the few cold weather spells this winter did not delay this project, and he says crews also want to be done before work on the Trans Mountain pipeline picks up in the area.

“The cold weather doesn’t generally impact when we are blasting. Those guys can get up there and do that work and we can take the rock away,” he noted. “That’s all that project was was trying to mitigate potentially unsafe rockfall hazards that are on that road corridor.”

The project was expected to cost around $650,000, and Crundwell was asked how much has been spent so far.

“I’m going to say at or under because I haven’t had any conversations with my team. I know its going well. Everything was done according to plan.”

When work got underway, city staff expected to have all the work completed by March 15.