A new rail plan that might work
Ken Gray,
The Ottawa Citizen Published: Friday, August 10, 2007

Another week, another light-rail plan. The difference with a new one developed by Alta Vista Councillor Peter Hume and a number of like-minded colleagues is that this one has legs, or perhaps more appropriately, steel wheels.

Since last December, we've had the original north-south light-rail plan. Then another makeshift plan cobbled together the same week.

After that, a group of south-end councillors tried to resurrect the original proposal but fell short on votes. Then there was a plan, still on the table, to extend the current heavy-rail O-Train farther south from Greenboro station to Leitrim Road. Then Mayor Larry O'Brien invited former federal transport minister David Collenette to create a rail plan.

Alta Vista Councillor Peter Hume and a number of his city council colleagues have developed a new light-rail plan that includes a downtown tunnel plus east-west and north-south routes.

And if all this isn't enough, Mr. O'Brien is touting a regional rail system from places like Casselman. The mayor, characteristically, is making lots of noise about this plan, but Health Promotion Minister Jim Watson, Queen's Park's front man on this file, says the province won't fund it unless Mr. O'Brien can produce a study that shows there is demand and the city deals with the municipality's rapid transit problems first. So scratch that effort.

So after all of this, what do we have? No plan with enough detail that the federal and provincial governments can fund it. Instead, we have the largest city in Canada without light rail or a subway.

One of the strengths of the latest proposal is the person behind it. Mr. Hume is a red Tory who is often able to straddle the chasms on what has become a very divided council. And he is respected by Mr. O'Brien.

Mr. Hume, in crafting this new plan, analysed why the original proposal failed.

First, that plan drove into the south end, Mr. Hume's turf, but it offered little to the majority of councillors in the west and east ends. Second, the lack of a tunnel left downtown businesspeople convinced that the proposed Albert-Slater route, already at capacity with buses, would just be an over-crowded mess.

The Hume plan attempts to overcome those hurdles. The councillor would start the light-rail line from Earl Armstrong Road near the Rideau River. Then the rail line would follow the route of the scrapped north-south plan (taking advantage of its already completed environmental assessment) to Bayview on LeBreton Flats. Barrhaven would be connected to the rail line by bus rapid transit.

After that, it would use a rail tunnel from the foot of Fleet Street on LeBreton Flats, under Sparks Street to the Conference Centre, where it would turn south under the east side of the Rideau Canal, surfacing just before the Queensway. Then it would follow the Transitway corridor to Hurdman station and the Via Rail terminal.

Mr. Hume says this part of the plan would cost less than $1 billion "though we might need some wiggle room there." Probably a lot of wiggle room.

But there is an added benefit to this proposal. Mr. Hume hopes Siemens would build it. That would dispose of the $177-million lawsuit that the Siemens group has filed against the city for trashing the old north-south contract. That lawsuit is a real danger to the city and its taxpayers, given the municipality's shaky budget situation. But there's a second phase to the Hume plan. In the east, the line would continue on from the Via station along the CN corridor and a city right-of-way south of Innes Road to Trim Road. In the west, the line would follow the Transitway route to Woodroffe Avenue and then take Richmond Road to the Highway 416-417 interchange. The whole project would be completed in nine years.

Working with Mr. Hume are all the usual suspects on rail: Councillors Diane Deans, Maria McRae, Steve Desroches, Clive Doucet and Diane Holmes. But by going east-west as well as north-south and downtown, Mr. Hume hopes to pick up the needed 13 votes on council to get it passed. The east-west part would give hope to councillors such as Peggy Feltmate, Alex Cullen, Rainer Bloess, Rick Chiarelli, Michel Bellemare, Georges Bdard and Rob Jellett that light rail would eventually get near their wards. Councillor Jacques Legendre would get his tunnel. That's 14 votes and there are probably a few more that could be picked up -- especially by someone as politically astute as Mr. Hume.

One of those votes should be Mr. O'Brien's. The Collenette proposal, commissioned by Mr. O'Brien, is impractical -- so the mayor needs something that works. Mr. Hume, who has the mayor's confidence, is throwing Mr. O'Brien a political life-preserver. The mayor -- buffeted by the loss of his two top political aides, an OPP investigation, and a council split at least three ways -- desperately needs a political win.

Mr. Hume's plan is that. The mayor could get behind a proposal that would have the majority of council supporting it; create a working majority for the mayor on council; put Mr. O'Brien's name all over this new, practical scheme; get rid of the Siemens suit; get downtown business behind a tunnel plan; access $400 million in federal and provincial funding for the project (maybe more from the province); and regain the support of the civic public service (that was demoralized by the demise of the north-south plan).

If Mr. O'Brien dismisses the Hume plan, he will be dogged by the failure of rail for the next three years. Polls show that the public is not happy with the city's handling of transit.

If Mr. O'Brien is smart, he will grab this idea by Mr. Hume and hold on for dear life. It could save his administration.

Ken Gray is the city editorial page editor and an editorial board member. His column runs on Fridays.

© The Ottawa Citizen 2007