If you are headed to Historic Main Street today (April 10) you will see beginning signs of construction that is expected to wrap up before May long weekend.

Another component of the downtown revitalization project is beginning, and although parking will be impacted, Suzanne Gaida, Town of Cochrane, Senior Manager of Community Services, says continue to shop local.

"All the businesses will remain open, so that is very important. The access to their doors will be there so we encourage people to continue utilizing and supporting our local businesses."

In order to maintain storefront access, construction fencing will be pushed into parking spots in front of the blocks construction crews will be working on. Good news is construction will occur a block at a time.

"We are going to do it block by block to try to reduce the impact on downtown by focusing on one block at a time. We are going to start with the Mackays block which is 1st and 2nd avenue. We will basically be about two to three weeks per block and then we will make our way up to the hotel block which is 2nd to 3rd avenue and do that for another two or three weeks.

If you were wondering what the project entails, Gaida gives a sneak peek.

"The biggest piece of this project is adding street trees. Currently, when you look at the downtown especially on the north side of the street all of the trees are on the corner and that was part of our revitalization that we did in the mid 2000s; what we want to do is add trees between the blocks to give it that look of green. We are also going to add benches with planter boxes, where we can."

Having places for people to sit in shade will hopefully encourage those on Main Street to stay longer. Not only was the town careful in choosing trees that will be hardy enough to handle Cochrane's zoning, but new technology will also be utilized.

"We are using a technology that has been developed for the purpose of planting trees in a hard environment, in order for trees to even have a chance you want to make sure the base is created correctly. We will be taking out the whole block of sidewalk and a whole infrastructure is going to be put in underground and it is called a silva cell. What that does is allow the trees to have enough soil and be cemented over but underneath there is a whole intricate system where water flows so the root system has a better chance of survival."

The intricate system will also aid in watering, create a catchment area for stormwater, and ensure long term success, growth, and survival of the newly planted trees.

Once this part of the revitalization project is completed, only the secondary gateway access on 5th ave will remain. While no date for that has been announced it will wrap up the budgeted $840,000 project Cochrane council approved.