November 15, 2011

Local heavy construction welcomes Ottawa draft city budget

GREG MECKBACH

digital media editor

As the federal government winds down its infrastructure stimulus fund from the previous two fiscal years, general contractors are happy with a draft budget tabled by the City of Ottawa, which includes 200 kilometres of road construction and $18.3 million to upgrade sewers.

“We’re just coming off the federal stimulus funding projects that were in excess of $350 million in Ottawa over a two-year period,” said Dale Harley, executive advisor for the National Capital Heavy Construction Association (NCHCA). “The funding that (The City of Ottawa is) talking about here is $340 million over a three-year period.”

Harley was reacting to an announcement Oct. 19 that staff had tabled a draft budget, which includes an “accelerated” capital spending plan, taking advantage of low interest rates.

The city’s capital plan, dubbed Ottawa on the Move, is intended to provide upgrades and repairs to existing roads, sidewalks, bridges and sewers. By getting interest rates of less than three per cent per annum, the city anticipates it would save $12.9 million on interest.

“They’re talking about doing five years of work within a three-year period, so we certainly have acceleration there,” Harley said. “They are also providing additional funding by going out and borrowing $125 million to accelerate projects, and of course whenever you’re accelerating projects or spending more on projects, that’s certainly going to be good for our members.”

The city would use the money to fund 150 infrastructure projects, including 200 km of road construction, 70 km of bicycle-lane and road-shoulder construction, 20 km of sidewalk building and bridges.

“We were heading into a valley as a result of coming off the federal stimulus funding and not seeing shovels in the ground until 2013 for the light rail, so original forecasts for capital projects this year, particularly structure renewal projects, was certainly going into a very, very deep valley, so this has been extremely good news.”

The federal stimulus funding Harley referred to was the Infrastructure Stimulus Fund, in which the federal government provided funds to construction projects that started during the 2009 and 2010 seasons but did not continue with the 2011 budget. Harley was also referring to Ottawa Light Rail Transit (OLRT), which the city and province plan to build between 2013 and 2017, in time for Canada’s 150th anniversary. The OLRT would run 12 km between the Tunney’s Pasture federal office complex in the west to Blair Station near Gloucester Centre in the east. There will be 13 stations, four of which would be underground downtown in twin tunnels 3.2 km in length. A week after the city budget announcement, Infrastructure Ontario released the names of three consortia invited to submit proposals to design, build, finance and maintain OLRT.

The draft budget includes $18.3 million to upgrade sewers, $24 million over three years on cycling infrastructure and $21.3 million to improve the stormwater system in Kanata.

The plan will be discussed at meetings of city council committees and at four public consultations this fall. A special meeting of city council is scheduled Nov. 30 to consider the recommendations from city boards and council committees. On the same day, the full council is scheduled to debate and finalize the budget.

Harley is optimistic that the full council will approve it.

“This was becoming an irritant for taxpayers, they were sharing that irritant with their councilors to express to them that they were concerned about the deteriorating conditions, particularly roads,” he said. “Our association had been reminding (councilors) for several years that this was a growing problem. Taxpayers were listened to and our association was listened to as well.”

NCHCA has emphasized the importance of resurfacing roads early, rather than waiting until roads deteriorated.

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