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Originally Posted by Acajack
In other news, advocates for the West Gatineau tramway were on Parliament Hill yesterday to urge the federal government to commit.
At least two Gatineau councillors (one of which is also the STO president) and a Bloc MP (from Montreal) and an NDP MP (from Vancouver) were there.
Noticeably absent were Liberal MPs from Gatineau Greg Fergus and Steven MacKinnon.
Fergus in particular has been quite silent on the issue for a while (the tramway would run in his riding) and according to the STO president never mentioned it once in his re-election campaign.
I'd love to see this happen but it's getting less and likely unfortunately.
The price tag is now approaching $4B.
Quebec has said they're in but the feds are a huge missing piece of the puzzle.
It sucks but I am wondering if a Rapibus BRT extension towards the west might not have been a more sellable and also quicker solution.
Right now we are looking at 2033 as the earliest for this thing to be in service.
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It's pretty pathetic that MPs from outside the region have to fight for us. Fergus was an early champion of the project, but now he's noticeably absent from the conversation. McKinnon and his bridge is likely to fail us as well. Both projects are needed. It might be a funding issue. End of the day, we'll lose both.
Worth noting that no one from Ottawa was there either. It would have been good to see Sutcliffe and Belisle (also absent), or even Plante or Troster.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Kitchissippi
With the mess Ottawa’s LRT is in, I doubt there’s an appetite to take on this project. Especially if something goes wrong (and something always seems to go wrong with transit projects) this one is literally at Parliament’s doorstep.
In many ways I am glad Watson and the last council pushed Stage 2 quickly no matter how opaque the process was. Government was eager to invest then, but this post-pandemic reckoning will see a lot of future projects shelved.
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It's not the same project though. Ottawa built a metro and threw trams on the tracks. It also value engineered the thing to death. No surprise it has issues. This would be a tram using a tram route.
And why should there be no apatite for the Gatineau tram, but anything and everything proposed in the GTHA is fine? Or the Quebec City tram? Or anywhere else?
Quote:
Originally Posted by Acajack
Still thinking we could get a Rapibus western extension with two branches (Plateau-Aylmer Nord & Taché-Aylmer Sud) for quite a bit less than 1 billion dollars.
And it could be ready a lot faster.
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But that would require canceling the current project and starting over. It would likely take 5 years to get to where we are now, at which point, we still wouldn't receive funding. How much funding was provided for the current RapiBus or the extension?
Quote:
Originally Posted by acottawa
I could see some sense in incorporating LRT when they rebuild the Alexandra bridge (maybe running it to the Chateau Laurier along the old rail corridor) I can't see the advantage of this proposal when compared to a bus, particularly if hybrid work continues.
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It's not just about commuters. Plateau and Aylmer are dense areas with good commercial areas. They are both growing fast and lack car infrastructure. This is exactly the place we would want a tram.
That said, I'm pretty confident the project will be canceled. I have no faith in our Federal politicians. They use the interprovincial complications as a reason for not funding, but Ontario is not involved and Ottawa supports the project. Worse case, build the Quebec side for now and figure out the rest later.
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