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Under the original plan, launched in 2007, “our government has now invested in more than 43,000 infrastructure projects from coast to coast to coast,” said Mr. Harper, who was accompanied by Denis Lebel, the federal minister of infrastructure.

Prior to Thursday’s announcement, the Federation of Canadian Municipalities (FCM) had been concerned the cash might not be in the hands of local governments by April 1, the start of the federal government’s new fiscal year and the official beginning of the construction season in Canada.

FCM president Claude Dauphin said Thursday the new extended fund “is a big step forward for our communities, for our cities, for new infrastructure.”

“Mr. Harper recognized the [the need] for predictable, stable money and a long-term plan with the government. So, that’s good news,” Mr. Dauphin, mayor of the Montreal borough of Lachine, said in an interview.

He said the FCM will continue working with the federal government “because there are still 45 days before April 1. ”

There have also been some concerns that the $14-billion funding level could be too thinly spread across the country over the 10-year period — equivalent to just over $1-billion every 12 months.

But Finance Minister Jim Flaherty this week defended the cost of the program, saying “infrastructure spending is not linear.”

“It’s like a hockey stick, okay, so you do the engineering planning at the beginning. It doesn’t cost that much relatively speaking and then all of a sudden, you have the large construction expenses,” he told reporters on Wednesday in Ottawa.