They could have funneled more money to homeless shelters, housing repairs or childcare subsidies, but instead, the city spent $2.8 million lighting the Prince Edward Viaduct.

From the start, it was a decision mired in controversy with (open John Tory's policard)critics, including Mayor John Tory (open John Tory's policard), picking at the cost, the time and the necessity of it all.

But on the evening of July 4, when the historic Bloor bridge that opened in 1918, will be awash with colour for the first time, artist Dereck Revington hopes those grumbles will fade.

He’ll watch, from the thick of a crowd, as the lights are flicked on and an illumination pattern begins. A surprise, Juno award-winning musician will be on hand for the lighting, and the Pan Am Games torch will make an appearance as well.

In the days after, Revington says, the colour and intensity of the structure’s glow will be based on temperature and wind strength.

“I wanted the light to play on the strings as if the wind was playing the strings in colour,” he said. “I wanted the bridge to be different moment by moment, day by day and season by season, so that when you encounter it as you are coming down the Don Valley, there is an anticipation of what the bridge is doing that night.”

Revington wants to make sure he sees the bridge, in all its glory and from every angle so he plans to traverse the area, catching a glimpse from up close and afar, from above and below.

“I think I will have to get a taxi service because I want to see it from every location,” he says, laughing and noting that a man passing the bridge one night while Revington was testing lighting even jokingly invited the artist to his balcony to catch a different view.

Moments like that, he says, where he has been able to ignite conversation between strangers through the shared experience of the bridge, are the point of the project.

“This is something I am doing for my own artistic interest, but also for a city I love,” he says. “The city has to be beautiful. Every building and every piece of landscaping should add to the city, like this one.”

Challenges

Lighting a 131-foot concrete-steel arch bridge towering above the Don River and featuring vehicle and bike lanes and TTC tracks wasn’t an easy feat. It took years of planning, through which the following proved tricky for artists and architects.

Cost: When the project first went out to tender, lighting artist Dereck Revington hoped to get the entire bridge glowing. Proposals came back with higher-than-anticipated price tags, nearing $5 million, so Revington cut out lighting the crescent arches on the bridge’s underside and the TTC portion of the structure.

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Access: After Revington and others created mockups and drew sketches, it was time to build what they had envisioned. Part of the challenge was contending with TTC crews repairing tracks on the bridge and workers completing rehabilitation work on the structure itself.

Light pollution: Opponents raised concerns about the illumination disrupting the environment, so Revington and others involved undertook research and sketches designed to minimize light pollution of the night sky. “We have shielded the lights so they only focus on the bridge and don’t focus on the sky,” said lighting designer Paul Boken.

Approval: When a suicide barrier/luminous veil was first planned for the bridge in 2003, the goal was to light the structure too, but the city decided it couldn’t shell out the cash just for aesthetics, so the idea was scrapped until a local BIA revived it a few years ago.