Trans Mountain says it’s within months of hitting its peak workforce in Kamloops for pipeline construction.

Spokesperson Kate Stebbing told Kamloops council there will at least 550 workers by early 2021 for the main contractor, Surerus Murphy Joint Venture.

“Also, to emphasize, the pipeline contractor [SMJV] is only one of our contractors in this area. Cord, our pump station contractor, typically has crews of about 30. Ledcor may have 10-15. We’ve got Michaels that’s working on the drill, they’ve got about 30 folks here as well. So those numbers are sort of the baseline, and I play them low because I’d rather provide the numbers I know than speculate on ones I don’t.”

Stebbing says as of this week, there are 222 people working in Kamloops on the pipeline. She says 83 of those workers are local and 40 are Indigenous.