Editorial
Len Crispino
The Business Executive
March 1, 2008
Let’s Get Ontario Moving
It’s a move in the
right direction but there remains a long road
ahead.
Last month the provincial
government approved changes to the Environmental
Assessment (EA) process as it applies to transit
projects, primarily to ensure the 52 projects
announced in the government’s transit plan
under Move Ontario 2020 don’t go off the
rails. Final approval is still required for these
regulatory changes.
The changes, once approved,
will partially address recommendations long made
by the Ontario Chamber of Commerce to streamline
what is now a protracted and unwieldy process.
The next step should be to expand these improvements
to include all other publicly funded infrastructure
projects.
The current EA process
can best be described as “stop and go”.
The cumbersome formula
regularly falls victim to unnecessary delays and
confusion. Take the following transportation infrastructure
projects that the Ontario Chamber continues vital
to the province’s economic growth.
The Niagara-to-GTA corridor,
an essential economic link between vital urban
growth centres in the Greater Golden Horseshoe,
is not expected to be clear of the first stage
of the EA process until 2009 and then stage 2
will follow. The first EA for this corridor began
in 2002.
The inordinate delays of
the Eastward extension of Highway 407 and the
extension of the 427 to Vaughan, have severely
impacted the economies in these regions, and contributed
to prolonged and damaging gridlock. Each car or
truck stuck in traffic represents an economic
loss – both to employers and their staff,
as well as to the provincial economy. Gridlock
in the Greater Golden Horseshoe alone is estimated
to rob the Ontario economy of $2 billion dollars
each year. And an idling car or truck is no friend
to our environment.
Long delays and detours during an EA also threaten
funding opportunities. Twenty-three million dollars
in Federal funding may well be at risk, for instance,
as the provincial EA process for the expansion
of Highway 402 to the Blue Water Bridge in Sarnia
drags on.
While environmental assessments are important,
they should be limited to concerns of an environmental
nature, and not be hijacked by other issues.
The regulatory amendments announced last month
by Premier Dalton McGuinty would help ensure transit
projects, whose Environmental Assessments begin
on June 1, 2008 or later, don’t fall victim
to the types of challenges described here for
major highway infrastructure projects.
Definitive timelines would be set for crucial
checkpoints along the way, including the overall
length of the EA from start to finish. A set timeframe
of 85 days would be established for public consultation,
a stage that currently contains no time limit.
And correspondingly, the Minister of the Environment
would be required to respond within 35 days. Again,
currently, there is no set timeframe within which
the public can expect to receive a response from
the MOE.
Communities relying on the expansion or development
of commuter rail lines and subway or bus rapid
transit routes, will certainly benefit from these
enhancements to the EA process for transit. But
why stop there? Our communities are connected
by a web of roads, rails, bridges, borders, air
and marine travel routes. An expedited EA process
that’s good for transit, is of equal benefit
to these other modes of transportation. We must
urgently address the growing infrastructure deficit
in this province, recognizing that physical infrastructure
is vital to our ability to grow our economy, and
ultimately, to keep Ontario working.
