On Monday night, Stacey Rumsby thought there was an earthquake and leaped out of her chair. “Things were falling off our shelves, pictures off the walls,” said the Saanich resident. “Our floor has been constantly vibrating.”
It wasn’t an earthquake. The rumblings and vibrations, which kept the family awake all night, were caused by construction realigning the Galloping Goose trail beside her Grange Road house as part of the McKenzie interchange project.
Her husband, Keith Rumsby, said there were two backhoes and a vibrating packer, and that bright light floods the area being worked on.
“It’s daylight here. It’s not night anymore. That guy is loading a little dump truck and the dump truck is driving by us, depositing this stuff. Then the roller is going over it and over it and over it to flatten it. Then he gets another load and does it again and again,” Keith Rumsby said.
The Rumsbys had no warning this was going to happen.
“The workers said they were going to be doing this all night long. On Tuesday night, they did a little bit of work, but they shut down because it was too wet. On Wednesday, they were back at it,” he said.
On Wednesday night, they sent their teenage daughter to stay with friends. Keith Rumsby drove to the construction office, but couldn’t find the supervisor. Eventually, they called Saanich police to make a noise complaint.
“The officer wrote in his report that the vibrations were going right through his feet,” Stacey Rumsby said.
Their insurance company took photographs of nails popping out of the walls and a crack in the floor. A heavy concrete bird bath toppled in their garden.
“But the big thing is lack of sleep,” said Stacey Rumsby, who was awakened again at 4 a.m. Friday. “I’m exhausted. It’s mentally draining.”
The foreman told the couple that the company is mandated by the Ministry of Transportation and Infrastructure to do all the work at night so it doesn’t affect daytime traffic on the Galloping Goose trail.
But that left the Rumsbys wondering why traffic on the trail can’t be diverted to Burnside Road. That way construction could take place during the day when children are in school and people are at work.
“Even the foreman said it would be easier and safer for him to work during the day,” Keith Rumsby said.
Neighbour Kay Bruner, who lives two doors down, said the disturbance is “cruel punishment” for the Rumsbys.
“I feel extremely sorry for them. I don’t know how they can take it,” Bruner said. “I can’t believe the ministry would be so insensitive that they haven’t found help for that family.
“I told my daughter: ‘I hope to hell Stacey and Keith are down at the Empress.’ ”
Bruner, who can feel the vibrations through her floors, shuts her drapes at night and puts on a white-noise machine to help her sleep.
She believes the Rumsbys should be compensated for what they have gone through.
The Rumsbys are also unhappy that their once-private garden is now completely exposed to trail users — their fences taken down, trees ripped apart and blackberry bushes removed.
Expropriation is an option, Stacey Rumsby said. “No one will buy our house now.”
An emailed statement from the Ministry of Transportation and Infrastructure left little hope for the family.
“The ministry is committed to being fiscally responsible with every aspect of this project,” says the email to the Times Colonist. “This means being careful with the expenditure of public funds with respect to property acquisition and compensation.”
The email explains that the ministry has tried hard to keep noise to a minimum for nearby residents and schools while balancing the need to keep traffic flowing. The contractor realigning the trail and building retaining walls in the area between Grange and Belgrave roads is scheduling the work to complete as much of it as possible during the day, it says.
But some of the work includes moving and reconstructing sections of the trail, and this requires full closure.
“This work must occur at night when we can safely close the Galloping Goose to cyclists and pedestrians,” the email says. “The work on the Galloping Goose trail at this location is anticipated to continue periodically throughout the next month.”
The ministry encourages people to contact them with questions, concerns or complaints at 250-387-8700 or [email protected].
The interchange is expected to open to traffic by summer 2019, rather than the end of 2018. The province delayed the project to make adjustments to traffic management and the blasting schedule in response to complaints from residents.
