On Thursday September 2nd, Prime Minister Stephen Harper visited Kitchener to announce that the federal government would contribute up to $265 million of the $800 million needed to build a rapid transit system linking Kitchener, Waterloo, and Cambridge. The federal government agreed to fund one-third of the proposed system as part of the Building Canada Plan.
The proposed rapid transit plan includes a 13 to 14 station light rail transit line (LRT) between Conestoga Mall in Waterloo and Fairview Park Mall in Kitchener, and a six station bus rapid transit (BRT) corridor from Fairview Park Mall to Ainslie Terminal in downtown Cambridge. If all goes according to plan, the rapid transit system should be operational by 2015.
The provincial government initially pledged two-thirds of the cost of the rapid transit project. However, earlier this year, the provincial government announced that funding would be scaled back to $300 million, leaving a $235 million shortfall that the region will have to overcome.
The $235 million shortcoming has caused councillors to question whether a light rail line is still feasible in Waterloo Region. In order to reduce costs to the local taxpayers, councillors are looking into modifying the rapid transit plan by scaling down or eliminating the light rail line in favour a longer bus rapid transit corridor.
“I will not support $235 million coming from the local taxpayers. That’s not affordable. So you have to look at either reducing the scope of the project … or you could go to an entirely bus-based system,” said Tom Galloway, a Regional Councillor from Kitchener.
Advocates for LRT argue that it better serves large groups of people, and considering the projected transit use increase and population growth, the operating costs will be lower than a BRT system. Furthermore, many advocates believe that LRT will attract more people, jobs, and businesses to the region than BRT. Additionally, it is believed that LRT would make people more inclined to regularly use public transit as it can be better handle large numbers of pedestrians and cyclists.
Critics of the project believe that BRT would be sufficient, and would come at a lower price to the local taxpayers.If the rapid transit plan was modified to lower the cost, the provincial government would still contribute $300 million, and the federal government would contribute one-third of the cost of the project.
The funding for the Waterloo Region project comes despite a cut-back in provincial funding to Toronto’s “Transit City” plan that will double the length of the first stage, from five years to ten years. As well, the funding also comes despite pleas from other cities looking for funding from the federal government, such as Hamilton, Mississauga and Brampton.
Leave a Reply