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Trudeau’s first budget allocated new money to a public transit fund, which can reduce CO2, but there was no commitment to shift money away from projects that increase pollution. Now there is a commitment, of sorts, in the fine print of the climate framework.

The framework commits the federal and provincial governments to “shift from higher- to lower-emitting types of transportation, including through investing in infrastructure.” The examples include shifting from driving to transit and cycling, as well as shifting freight from trucks to rail.

This is not a new completely new development. The NDP and Greens helped pass Liberal MP Andy Fillmore’s private member’s bill to the same effect in September. Bill M-45 calls for analysis of the greenhouse-gas impact of every infrastructure funding proposal over half-a-million dollars, and for giving funding priority to projects that reduce climate pollution.

The cliché “you can’t build your way out of congestion” is well-supported by studies and experience. Roadway expansion in urban areas worsens both pollution and congestion. In a 2007 study, Clark Williams-Derry of the SightLine Institute found that “adding one mile of new highway lane will increase CO2 emissions by more than 100,000 tons over 50 years.” Considering that transportation is the second-biggest source of climate pollution in Canada, the effect of road expansion must not be ignored.

But until now climate impacts have, for the most part, been ignored. Ontario’s Highway 427 Expansion project in Metro Toronto is proceeding with barely a mention of carbon pollution. One rather disturbing exception is B.C.; instead of ignoring climate impacts, Clark makes the ridiculous claim that urban highway expansion projects reduce pollution.