OTTAWA — The National Capital Commission will eventually come around to the city’s vision for a western extension of its light-rail system, city council’s transportation committee decided Wednesday. Of course, it might take a few years.

“We’re not just going to say, ‘NCC, we bow to you.’ Because we’re not. We’re tired of it,” warned Rideau-Vanier Coun. Mathieu Fleury, a sentiment several councillors echoed before voting on a route for a western LRT line that will require use of over a kilometre of the NCC’s land close to the Ottawa River near McKellar Park. The commission’s board has twice voted to say it doesn’t like the city’s vision and wants a rail line that’s practically invisible and doesn’t block people wanting to walk to its Sir John A. Macdonald Parkway. That means 500 metres of track the city wants to build in a trench along the parkway just west of Dominion station are a serious problem.

Practically speaking, meeting the NCC’s demands means burying the line and that means spending more than the $980 million the city’s planners estimate the latest version of the plan will cost. That figure is already up from a $900-million version of the plan they proposed in spring, thanks to modifications aimed (unsuccessfully) at getting the NCC’s approval.

“Make no mistake about it, the coffers of the taxpayers of this city are not a bottomless pit,” said Barrhaven Coun. Jan Harder. She’s against spending money at the whim of an unelected federal agency that answers to nobody, she said.

Both the committee’s chair, Coun. Keith Egli, and the senior city staffer responsible for the planning, deputy city manager Nancy Schepers, shrugged off the fact the NCC board had twice voted that neither the original plan nor the revised one is good enough to justify the commission’s giving up land. The commission had to approve the city’s use of federal property for the 12.5-kilometre stretch of line that’s beginning construction downtown now, Schepers said: that didn’t come until last February, when construction was on the brink of starting.

The western leg of the LRT line, between Tunney’s Pasture and Baseline station, isn’t due to start construction till 2017 or 2018, she said, and that’s plenty of time to reach an agreement. Schepers told councillors she believes her staff and consultants can come up with a plan that will meet with NCC approval without significantly increasing the price.

“Great,” said Egli. “We’ll hold you to that.”

The city and the NCC work together all the time, Egli said, just not always smoothly. They have different ways of looking at things, different planning processes. “Over time, they can collide,” Egli said. “But over time, they can coalesce, they can run in sync.”

With their unanimous vote, councillors on the committee signalled they’re done making major changes to accommodate nearby residents, many of whom have objected to having trains and stations close to their homes and are even less satisfied with the changes the city’s made than the NCC is. The planners will keep working on tweaks — Schepers said the city could start planting trees along the route sooner, so they’ll have five years to grow before the line’s eventual builders cut down other trees for the construction project — but the city is committing to the route. Indeed, councillors spent much of the meeting Wednesday needling residents who came to object to the plans.