The City of Calgary has closed an exit ramp off the TransCanada Highway in the city’s northwest after wire snaps were detected along the ailing Bearspaw feeder main.
In an update to residents Friday morning, the city announced the exit ramp from the westbound 16 Avenue N.W. exit to Sarcee Trail is closed, and that traffic would be detoured to 29 Avenue N.W.
The city said the detour would be in place “until further notice” and is meant to “support public safety.”
City crews are focused on two segments of the feeder main that have an “enhanced level of deterioration,” and are taking precautionary measures after each segment experienced wire snaps detected by the city’s fibre optic monitoring.
“As we continue to operate the pipe in its current condition and scenario plan, our risk mitigation strategies will continue to evolve,” the city said in its update.
According to the city, crews are closely monitoring the pipe, but no changes are being made to the operating pressure of the feeder main at this time as “changes to pressure come with additional risk.”
Get daily National news
Get the day’s top news, political, economic, and current affairs headlines, delivered to your inbox once a day.
The segments in question appear near the site where the feeder main that carries 60 per cent of the city’s drinking water ruptured on Dec. 30 2025, its second critical failure in less than two years.
The Bearspaw feeder main, which carries 60 per cent of Calgary’s drinking water, has suffered two ‘catastrophic’ breaks in less than two years.
Global News
Following that break, which forced citywide water restrictions for nearly three weeks, city officials warned there is no guarantee the pipe won’t rupture again.
Much of the Bearspaw feeder main is made of pre-stressed concrete cylinder pipe, installed in 1975. The layers of concrete are encased in a steel cylinder and wrapped with high-tension steel wires and coated in mortar.
A “wire snap” is when those steel coils wrapped tightly around the pipe break due to stress or corrosion.
According to the city, monitoring has heard a total of three wire snaps along the line since the feeder main was repressurized and returned to service last month.
Following the feeder main’s original break in June 2024, city crews reinforced and replaced dozens of pipe segments deemed to be at risk of failure.
In response to the pipe’s failure late last year, the City of Calgary announced it is fast-tracking a project to replace the aging pipe, which will see a steel pipe installed parallel to the existing line.
A map of the Bearspaw feeder main replacement project.
Global News
City officials have maintained the replacement pipe will be completed by December, while original timelines had a completion date in 2028.
More to come…
© 2026 Global News, a division of Corus Entertainment Inc.
