Get It Right: Community & business groups send message to City Council on LRT

Good Morning, my name is Peter Hillier and I represent a group of concerned Ottawa South residents who formed Save our Greenspace as a result of learning that the City had included a valuable Greenspace between our community and the Airport Parkway as a potential site for the North-South LRT Maintenance Yard.

As a result we participated in a much broader Public Working Group of concerned residents and other stakeholders, including the Airport Authority, Ottawa Chamber of Commerce, etc to decide among 3 locations, all well noted in the press. After 8 weeks of deliberations (extended by 3 weeks at the demand of participants), education as to the environmental impacts and other social impacts, etc, the Public Working Group recommended by a very high margin that the Walkley Yard be reused as the site for expanded LRT operations for a variety of reasons, including adhering to the Provincial and Federal commitments to reuse of Brownfields, protection of the environment, protection of the Scenic Route that is the parkway, and valuable and declining urban greenspaces.

At days end, City Staff commissioned the consultants, hired to educate the PWG to come to a rational recommendation, to submit their own recommendation. They chose a site only introduced during the PWG process and it has since been ratified as the acceptable location by City Council.

This only goes to demonstrate the lack of voice residents of this city have during processes like this one. This project has some very severe financial risks associated with it. It has climbed significantly from a 400 million to 900 million dollar project and with normal scope creep associated with very large infrastructure projects of any kind we can anticipate a minimum of 30% beyond that. From 400m to 1.2 Billion is a very large hike and the Provincial and Federal Governments are only funding 400 million. There hasn’t been much publicity from the Mayors office as to where the rest of the money is coming from, but as a resident of this city I’m very concerned about the tax hikes that will be associated with this and the East-West project as they unfold.

It is high time that the leadership of this City become accountable to the rate payers. The back room politicking has to stop. Councilors have to stand up and commit to doing exactly what it is they are being paid to do and that is to do what is right for the City; not just their own backyard.

Residents of this city have to educate themselves about how this project will affect them. Write your councilor and demand that the project be deferred until after the election. If the Mayor and Council are not accountable now, I’m sure they will find themselves accountable in November.

Thank you,

Peter J. Hillier

Save our Greenspace