It's not quite yet time to break out the champagne for the Hwy. 1A-22 interchange upgrade, says Mayor Jeff Genung.

While the town is optimistic over the inclusion of the interchange in Thursday's Alberta budget, Genung intends to continue to lobby for the project until equipment arrives for its construction.

"This is a huge step forward," says Genung. "I don't want to rain on anyone's parade or throw cold water on the party, but I will not be popping champagne until we actually have an excavator or a dozer or something and we'll smash the bottle on the track of the excavator."

Genung points to a couple of lines in the list of Transportation infrastructure projects. The first one is the disclaimer that everything in the budget is subject to change. Secondly, the project is still listed in the design phase and no firm construction timeline has been set. 

Nor has the town received written confirmation or an announcement from Transportation minister Ric McIver.

"Until there is construction equipment on-site, earthmoving, I'm going to continue to operate as if it's not in the budget. I think we can't take our foot off the gas at this point. We can't take anything for granted"

"I'm optimistic, but we've been here before so I'm trying to play it carefully. We don't want to go out and celebrate--have fireworks, have a party--and then turn around to find it gets pulled for some reason."

Alberta Transportation officials visited Genung last week to provide an update. He was told there remains a bit of archaeological work and dealings on a pipeline right-of-way in the design phase.

"They simply need to dot the I's and cross the T's but that all takes time," says Genung.