Special Report: Light Rail Councillor Nann: Reject LRT Cancellation, Ask Feds for Funding The Ward 3 Councillor is requesting an emergency Council meeting to reject the Provincial cancellation or the Hamilton LRT project and to request federal funding. By Ryan McGreal

Published December 17, 2019

Ward 3 Councillor Nrinder Nann is calling on her Hamilton City Council colleagues to hold an emergency meeting to reaffirm the City's commitment to the light rail transit (LRT) project the Ontario Government just abruptly canceled, and to request federal funding to complete the project.

Councillor Nann calls the Province's cost estimate "deeply misleading", noting that they conflate capital costs with 30-year operating costs to create a perception that Hamilton's projct "was somehow going to be wildly more expensive than already in progress and complete LRT projects in Waterloo, Toronto and Ottawa."

For example, Waterloo Region's ION LRT system, an 18 km surface line similar to Hamilton's 14 km route, was recently completed for less than $1 billion.

Ward 1 Councillor Maureen Wilson has asked the Province to share their cost analysis which concluded the project will cost $5.5 billion.

Nann points out that this project has been under development since 2007 and has more than 70 Council votes behind it, and that the Hamilton Chamber of Commerce credits the planned line with a 500 percent increase in new downtown residential development. The construction was also going to include necessary infrastructure renewal along the corridor while creating thousands of jobs.

She summarizes, "Losing this project is akin to literally throwing hundreds of millions of dollars, billions in future investments, thousands of jobs and 13 years of hard-fought community advocacy down the toilet."

In light of a dubious Provincial offer to establish a task force to find other ways to spend $1 billion on transportation in Hamilton, Nann proposes a Council motion to "re-commit to using the entire $1.3 billion promised to build the LRT system" and to "immediately request that the Federal Government commit to a financial partnership with the city" to complete the project.

Following is the full text of her letter:

December 17th, 2019 Time to Build our Future It's not over. Yesterday, with no warning, and despite many, repeated promises to the contrary, Doug Ford's provincial conservative government pulled the plug on Hamilton's 13 year journey to building a world-class transit system. Using deeply misleading numbers which included both operating and maintenance costs over a 30 year period, they falsely and maliciously claimed that Hamilton's LRT project was somehow going to be wildly more expensive than already in progress and complete LRT projects in Waterloo, Toronto and Ottawa. This is simply not the case. Since 2008, Hamilton City Council has voted in favour of LRT, almost unanimously, 70+ times. Our last election, largely seen as a referendum on LRT, showed overwhelming support from the community in favour of it. 60 properties have been bought, $184 million spent, hundreds of residents and business displaced or renovicted. The Chamber of Commerce reports that the LRT project has already resulted in a 500 percent increase in downtown residential units. The entire downtown secondary plan is based on completion of the project. But even that isn't the whole picture. The $1.3 billion committed to build our LRT includes critical below the road infrastructure replacement like century-old sewers and water pipes and the redesign and beautification of 14km of our main commercial and residential thoroughfares. And in the midst of a climate emergency, fully electric transportation is the future and a leading solution to reducing Hamilton's nation-leading GHG emissions. Losing this project is akin to literally throwing hundreds of millions of dollars, billions in future investments, thousands of jobs and 13 years of hard-fought community advocacy down the toilet. And that is why, my council colleagues, we cannot allow this to happen. The provincial government is now saying that we can still have the $1.3b, and we can spend it any way we want. Yet, there's no timeline and no process. We cannot allow ourselves to be fooled again. If we accept that LRT is over, we'll spend the next 13 years squabbling over how to spend imaginary money that may never materialize. That $1.3b was committed for LRT, not for roads, not for buses, not for stadiums, not for anything else but a once in a generation city-building project that Hamiltonians have by and large embraced. So, let's take that $1.3 billion promised and build our LRT. And let's demand that the federal government step in to ensure that it goes ahead, exactly as planned. Given the urgency of this matter, I am calling for an emergency meeting of Hamilton City Council, where I will move the following motion: WHEREAS: Hamilton City Council has voted 70+ times over the last 13 years in favour of building an LRT. WHEREAS: Several Provincial Governments have committed $1.3 billion to build it. WHEREAS: $184 million has already been spent on this project. WHEREAS: The current provincial government claims we can still use the $1.3b billion for LRT. WHEREAS: The Federal Government is committed to partnering with municipalities on financing transit and infrastructure projects. BE IT RESOLVED THAT: A) The City of Hamilton, through this motion, re-commit to use the entire $1.3 billion promised to build the LRT system, exactly as has already been exhaustively planned and approved, and nothing else. B) Hamilton City Council immediately request that the Federal Government commit to a financial partnership with the city to ensure that the LRT project gets completed exactly as planned and approved. Yours in Community, Councillor Nrinder Nann

Ward 3 - City of Hamilton

Editor's Note: Hamilton Light Rail has launched a new campaign calling on Hamiltonians to send Premier Ford a message calling in him to fix Minister Mulroney's mistake and get the Hamilton LRT back on track. Please join the call to action and make your voice heard.

Ryan McGreal, the editor of Raise the Hammer, lives in Hamilton with his family and works as a programmer, writer and consultant. Ryan volunteers with Hamilton Light Rail, a citizen group dedicated to bringing light rail transit to Hamilton. Ryan wrote a city affairs column in Hamilton Magazine, and several of his articles have been published in the Hamilton Spectator. His articles have also been published in The Walrus, HuffPost and Behind the Numbers. He maintains a personal website, has been known to share passing thoughts on Twitter and Facebook, and posts the occasional cat photo on Instagram.

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