Months-long full closure of Broadway at Cambie Street for subway construction | Daily Hive

Months-long full road closure of West Broadway at Cambie Street for subway construction

Months-long full road closure of Broadway at Cambie Street for subway construction

After being fully closed for nearly four months, the provincial government announced today that the section of East Broadway between Quebec Street and Main Street will partially reopen to vehicle traffic on May 20, 2026. One lane in each direction will reopen while work continues on the full restoration of this one block of roadway above the future Mount Pleasant Station on SkyTrain’s Millennium Line Broadway extension.

Since it began in late January 2026, the complete closure — along with a detour one block north to East 8th Avenue — had been deemed necessary to allow for the safe and efficient removal of the temporary traffic decks above the construction site for the new Mount Pleasant Station.

This month’s scheduled partial reopening of East Broadway between Quebec Street and Main Street is one week earlier than scheduled. Furthermore, all four permanent vehicle lanes on this block will reopen in July 2026, instead of the previous timeline of September 2026.

Ever since this disruptive deck-removal strategy was first announced for Mount Pleasant Station last fall, there has been uncertainty over whether the same full road-closure approach would also be required for the four other new subway stations being built beneath Broadway.

Today, the provincial government confirmed that a full road closure will only be required at one additional subway station site: Broadway-City Hall Station.

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The work necessary at Broadway-City Hall Station will be a full closure of two blocks of West Broadway between Cambie Street and Alberta Street, with the detour beginning this summer after the FIFA World Cup.

Businesses and the general public will be given two weeks’ notice before the temporary disruptions at Broadway-City Hall Station begin. More details will be provided at a later date on the detour route and impacts to bus public transit services, especially the busy 99 B-Line route.

In the meantime, outreach to local businesses is already underway as the project team consults with them to help finalize the plans. Business access will be retained, as the sidewalks will remain open.

east broadway quebec main streets mount pleasant station construction may 5 2026

Construction progress on restoring the East Broadway roadway above Mount Pleasant Station between Quebec and Alma streets, as of May 5, 2026. (Government of B.C.)

However, the prolonged full road closure around Mount Pleasant Station has been a major source of concern for local businesses, many of which warned from the outset that they might not survive the impacts of the disruption and had previously requested that the provincial government provide urgent financial relief. The confirmation that a similar closure will also be required around Broadway-City Hall Station could now raise fresh concerns among businesses in that area as well.

According to the provincial government, the full road closure of West Broadway between Cambie Street and Alberta Street will enable restoration work on the roadway to occur within a six-month timeline. Without the full road closure, it would take 14 months.

This upcoming full road closure spans a larger area of two blocks because the temporary traffic deck in the area covers both the Millennium Line subway station structure for Broadway-City Hall Station on the west block between Cambie Street and Yukon Street, and a major crossover track switch for the east block between Yukon Street and Alberta Street.

East 8th Avenue detour via Quebec Street; first day of the Broadway full closure between Main and Quebec streets on Jan. 26, 2026. (Kenneth Chan)

east 8th avenue main quebec broadway detour jan 2026

Traffic conditions on the East 8th Avenue detour between Quebec and Main streets for the East Broadway construction closure, as seen on Jan. 26, 2026. (Sieva K./Vision Zero Vancouver)

Earlier this spring, a bulletin issued by the project office noted that the removal of the subway’s only other two-block-long temporary traffic deck between Arbutus Street and Cypress Street — above Arbutus Station and another major crossover track switch — will require a temporary vehicle traffic configuration of one lane in each direction.

As full road closures have been deemed unnecessary for the removal of the temporary traffic decks at South Granville Station and Oak-VGH Station, it can be assumed that at least partial West Broadway roadway lanes will remain open during the work.

This work involves not only the safe deconstruction of the temporary traffic decks, which are essentially bridge structures spanning over the subway station sites, and the completion of the new street design, but also covering and compacting the space above the station roofs with gravel and installing new permanent utilities.

The provincial government today also reaffirmed that this 6 km-long, six-station expansion of the Millennium Line between the existing VCC-Clark Station and Arbutus Street is on schedule to open in Fall 2027.

Last week, TransLink indicated that a Mark I SkyTrain train has now been positioned on the project’s short segment of new elevated guideway just west of VCC–Clark Station, marking preparations for the start of testing on the Millennium Line Broadway extension in the very near future.

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