Highway 4 on track to fully reopen by Labour Day, but concerns about future closures loom

Highway 4 leading to the west coast of Vancouver Island is set to fully reopen before the upcoming Labour Day long weekend, after it shut down following a devastating wildfire in early June.

Highway 4 leading to the west coast of Vancouver Island is set to fully reopen before the upcoming Labour Day long weekend, after it shut down following a devastating wildfire in early June.

“The soils become what they call hydrophobic, which essentially means they’ve become fully baked, there’s no organics, there’s no roots basically holding anything on those embankments down anymore,” said Ashok Bhatti, executive director of the Ministry of Transportation for the South Coast region.

What began as an initial three-week full closure turned into single-lane alternating traffic all summer long.

Recently there have been two full day closures to complete scaling work along the slope above the road, with another scheduled for Tuesday.

“Just a tremendous amount of materials that we have been able to bring down,” said Bhatti. “We just have this small section on Angel Rock that’s left, that’s what prompted the closure for tomorrow.”

The highway disruptions have deterred many travellers from making the trip to the west coast.

“It’s just been a really challenging, frustrating year,” said Krissy Montgomery, owner and operator of Surf Sister Surf School.