City bureaucrats decided to scrap a bus rapid transit tunnel beneath part of downtown because they feared its cost could skyrocket past $300 million, far more than previously disclosed, sources tell The London Free Press.

The dust has settled in the weeks since city council agreed to cancel the 900-metre span that was at the heart of both the BRT project and the backlash against it. The tunnel was initially projected to cost $90 million or so.

The BRT plan, now scaled back and tunnel-free, is moving ahead.

But what exactly happened behind closed doors leading up to the dramatic decision to kill the tunnel?

Based on a series of interviews inside and outside city hall,The Free Press has compiled a tick-tock of the tense weeks in May when consultant IBI Group revealed its tunnel cost estimates skyrocketed, city staff clashed, already-embattled politicians winced and a key piece of London’s transit future was spiked — possibly forever.

“Were (city officials) surprised it came in higher? No,” one well-placed source said of the cost estimate. “Were they surprised it came in that high? Yes.”

City hall had spent a year developing a $560-million BRT system that would run high-frequency buses along L- and 7-shaped corridors bisecting London. At the heart was the bus-only tunnel running under Richmond Row, at first estimated to cost $90 million.

The tunnel became a lightning rod for criticism, both from concerned taxpayers and downtown merchants who argued construction, and permanent changes related to it, could kill their businesses. There were also forces that wanted BRT dead at any cost, and the tunnel was a useful punching bag.

The $90-million construction cost estimate was always considered low. It was certain to rise.

But then, suddenly, it exploded.

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May 3 was already a big day on London’s BRT calendar. Roughly 1,000 Londoners — many of them angry core merchants — were to pack Budweiser Gardens for a final public meeting before city council finalized its BRT routes.

Unbeknownst to those rolling in to the 4 p.m. session the proposal had taken a dramatic turn mere hours earlier.

City hall’s consultant, IBI Group, had dropped a bombshell on city officials that day: The tunnel’s construction would now cost as much as $220 million — 60 per cent above the initial upper limit, $135 million.

That $220 million figure, which stunned city officials, was soon made public. But sources say city officials believe the tunnel price tag could eventually have exceeded $300 million.

Again, the total BRT price tag, including the early tunnel estimate, was $560 million, with city hall’s stake capped at $130 million and the rest needed from Ottawa and Queen’s Park. If tunnel costs ballooned, it’s unlikely Ottawa or the province would cover much of it — meaning the local share would jump considerably.

There were a number of factors for the skyrocketing construction cost, sources say:

— Conditions exist to turn beneath-downtown soil into a quicksand-like goo, potentially destabilizing old buildings.

— Soil could be stabilized with chemicals, but that’s extremely costly.

— Cost estimate for the underground station at Richmond/Oxford streets jumped.

— Heating and ventilation prices went up, too

So, in short, city officials always knew the tunnel would be a challenging project. But now — given the increased costs, and fears it could get even higher — it looked irresponsible to some of them.

May 4, one day after the Budweiser Gardens public meeting, a steering committee overseeing BRT plans met to dissect the jacked-up tunnel costs. Its members include bureaucrats Kate Graham, Barry Card, John Fleming, Kelly Scherr and Martin Hayward.

The meeting, one source says, was “tense” as they clashed over whether the tunnel was still wise at that price. It’s believed the final call fell to Hayward, city hall’s top manager.

About a week later, on May 11, The Free Press broke the story that city officials were withdrawing their recommendation to build the tunnel. The next week, politicians followed that advice and voted to scrap it.

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The vote to kill the tunnel was lop-sided, with only councillors Stephen Turner, Mo Salih and Jesse Helmer really voting to keep it.

It was an especially difficult evening for Mayor Matt Brown who, weeks earlier, had publicly declared his support for the tunnel — not knowing yet that construction costs were exploding.

Looking back, Brown isn’t pulling punches.

“I was extremely disappointed that the dollar value could be off by so much. I was clear about that with staff,” he said in a recent interview.

“But I’ve always maintained that we need to make a decision based on evidence and this new information allowed me to realize we needed to move forward with 96 per cent of the project.”

That deleted four per cent represents the length of the tunnel, relative to the rest of the system. While a 900-metre span doesn’t sound like much in the context of a 24-kilometre system, it was crucial to its busiest portion, the so-called north corridor running from downtown to Masonville Place mall, with Western University in between.

Without a tunnel to bypass the level rail crossing on Richmond Row, train delays could gum up the system and make it less reliable, and therefore less popular. The system-stalling rail line takes the “rapid” out of rapid transit, critics say.

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As reaction to the tunnel’s demise calms, one things is clear: It had nothing to do with Down Shift, the anti-BRT camp made up largely of downtown merchants and led by Mike Smith, who owns downtown bars Toboggan and Joe Kools.

The group’s oft-nasty tactics successfully undermined the project — they focused largely on city hall’s weak public engagement — and also helped drive an ugly wedge into the community.

They were accused of publishing misleading information on BRT. It may have been an effective way to shape public opinion — but it didn’t kill the tunnel, multiple sources say.

“This was straight-up practicality,” one source said. “Dollars and cents and value proposition.”

As another person noted: if Down Shift’s efforts had succeeded, the whole BRT north corridor would have been moved west to Wharncliffe/Western roads as they demanded. Instead, it’ll now run on dedicated lanes on Richmond Street.

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For now, London is pitching a $440-million BRT system with no tunnel beneath Richmond Row. It’s hard to imagine the city not securing the combined $310 million needed from Ottawa and Queen’s Park, both of which have transit cash and a willingness to spend it.

In the future — who knows how long? — there may be another option to bypass the Richmond Row level rail crossing that’s undermining the BRT project. Or maybe there won’t.

But consider this: The downtown tunnel was contentious, but a Free Press/MainStreet Research poll conducted just before the final decision indicated there was as much support for it as opposition among decided Londoners.

And had the tunnel’s cost estimate not ballooned — which, in turn, prompted staff to yank their recommendation to build it — there was almost certainly enough political support on city council to approve the landmark project.

It would have been controversial. But it would have happened.

“It’s always difficult to speculate,” Brown said. “Had the tunnel cost still been at $90 million, it’s reasonable to expect it would have passed.”

pmaloney@postmedia.com

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Mainstreet - London May 2017 by The London Free Press on Scribd