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A bridge too far

On Friday of this week, Metro Vancouver council will meet to very likely ask the federal government to submit Premier Christy Clark’s proposal to replace the Massey Tunnel with a 10-lane bridge to a Canadian Environmental Assessment Review Panel.
George Massey Tunnel. Photo: Rob Kruyt
George Massey Tunnel. Photo: Rob Kruyt

On Friday of this week, Metro Vancouver council will meet to very likely ask the federal government to submit Premier Christy Clark’s proposal to replace the Massey Tunnel with a 10-lane bridge to a Canadian Environmental Assessment Review Panel.

It is likely to approve that motion because two weeks ago the Metro Vancouver Intergovernmental Committee passed a similar resolution.

It is a resolution that found its genesis at Richmond city council after it received a report from longtime councillor Harold Steves.

Richmond Mayor Malcolm Brodie told me earlier this week that the Port Mann Bridge replacement was “just a bridge.”

What Clark is planning to replace the Massey Tunnel with is much more than that. Which is why the feds should be in the picture.

Part of the plan is to dredge out the river so much larger ships can make it all the way up to the Fraser Surrey Docks across from New Westminster.

Steves puts the impact this way:  by “removing the tunnel to allow dredging to 15.5 meters” — which is four metres deeper than the river is now — “this will convert the Fraser to an industrial river.  It will have a dramatic effect on the fishing industry, habitat and farmland and even impact dykes.”

When Gordon Campbell was the Liberal premier and Kevin Falcon was his Minister of Transportation, the government’s long range plan after seismically upgrading the Massey Tunnel, was to “twin” it, making it a couple of lanes wider.

Then, of course, Christy Clark replaced Campbell in 2011, and a year later, this grand scheme popped out of her mouth.

The driving forces behind the plan to dredge and bridge are the federal Crown corporation, Port Metro Vancouver, and Fraser Surrey Docks. According to information gathered through Freedom of Information requests by Steves and his allies, Port Metro Vancouver wants to expand its operations and has its eyes on 2,500 acres of what is now Fraser Valley farmland in Richmond and Delta to make that happen.

Fraser Surrey Docks also want to expand its operations as a shipping point for coal and other carbon-based fuels. One small example of why the dredging is necessary can be found in the movement of jet fuel up the river. While Port Metro Vancouver has approved jet fuel movement on the Fraser, as things stand now, there is only one hour a day at the highest tide that a ship carrying that fuel can clear the tunnel. And that one hour of high tide only occurs 250 days a year. Hence the need to dredge.

There is also the matter of what going from a four-lane tunnel to a 10-lane bridge will mean. If history has anything to tell us, expect a lot more development south of the Fraser putting even more pressure on precious farm land. And expect more cars plugging the roads coming into and out of Vancouver, particularly given there are no plans to do anything with the Knight Street Bridge or the already chronic bottle neck at the Oak Street Bridge.

Now, Christy Clark has not only announced her intention to replace the tunnel with a bridge, she had made it her number one infrastructure priority. And that does not go down well with the region.

Here’s Mayor Brodie. “The region needs a strategic plan for metro transportation. Surely the tunnel or its replacement is a very important part of this.” But the region’s top infrastructure priorities are the light rail lines planned for Surrey, the Broadway SkyTrain line for Vancouver and replacing the Pattullo Bridge. The overall goal for the region is to continue to “get people out of cars.”

As he sees it, Clark’s bridge will only increase car traffic. And, while Clark is still insisting the region hold a referendum for new tax revenue (did we learn nothing from the last one?) she hasn’t asked anybody about spending $3.5 billion on her bridge.

Brody is not the only regional politician irked by this inequity. He also points out that Clark’s bridge is in competition for funding with the region’s goals.

This conflict of interest, however, was set in motion long before the government in Ottawa changed hands. It is worth noting, therefore, in

Justin Trudeau’s first budget there’s money for the region, but there was no mention of Clark’s bridge.

@allengarr