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Just in time to celebrate the Canadian sesquicentennial, a prominent piece of Windsor riverfront has been cordoned off by the municipality in preparation for the biggest flag to ever fly in the local sky.

“I’m very excited for our community — this is about all of us as Canadians,” said Peter Hrastovec of the Great Canadian Flag Project.

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Drilling begins soon for the nine massive piles that will be buried more than 30 metres into the ground at the foot of Ouellette Avenue. Base plates nearly two metres in width will then be installed to help anchor the 150-foot (45.7 metres) flagpole to be topped by a Canadian Maple Leaf flag measuring 60 feet by 30 feet (18 metres by nine metres).

After five years of planning and community fundraising, Hrastovec — a local lawyer and chairman of the project — said the timing is perfect, coinciding with the 150th anniversary of Canada’s birth as a nation.

While the flag sounds massive, project construction manager and civil engineer Dave Woodall said once the Maple Leaf is flying at nearly the height of the CIBC highrise at Ouellette and Riverside Drive, it will hardly cover a bit of the Detroit skyline. But it will certainly get noticed from the American side.