Thank you, Mr. Menicoche. Minister Beaulieu.
Thank you, Madam Chair. We may have that information here but it’s a fairly standard amount. Each year we go out, or in blocks of time we go out to tender to maintain all our highways, and the contract to maintain Highway No. 7 would be similar to what has occurred previously. If you give us a minute, perhaps we’re able to find the amount.
We have the amount. It’s $800,000.
With the $800,000 I wasn’t too clear if the Minister said that it was part of the contract, or else is this additional investment like replacing culverts and strengthening the road that’s outside the standard maintenance contract?
The deputy minister has the amounts here. I will get either the director or the deputy minister to do a response. Maybe the deputy minister.
Thank you, Mr. Beaulieu. Mr. Neudorf.
Thank you, Madam Chair. We did have a forced growth submission that’s in the budget here for contracts within the Fort Simpson region, and that total is the $800,000 that the Minister had referenced before. It’s for a number of different contracts including the highway maintenance contract. Total spent on Highway No. 7 maintenance is about $2.5 million. The contract with Fort Simpson region takes care of part of Highway No. 7 and also Highway No. 1. I don’t have the breakdown of that contract amount between the two different highways, but the total highway contracts within for Beaver and for Rowe’s Construction are about $2.5 million.
Thank you, Mr. Neudorf. Mr. Menicoche.
Thank you very much, Madam Chair. Just when it comes to the expenditures of extra work on Highway No. 7 or any of the highways around Fort Simpson, I’ve always said that Nahendeh, because we don’t have industry or anything around, that government supplies a large portion of the contracts to the service sector there. So any work that they can do on the highway systems there and extra work on Highway No. 7 is certainly a benefit to the communities and the people that I represent as we have more work for them.
Just as a note, I’d just like to continue to support any investment that we can, and yes, I know that we’ve got passive restraint, but any projects that have been planned, I certainly urge the department to continue with them as we move forward into this year.
Thank you, Mr. Menicoche. I’ll take that as a comment. I’ll go to Ms. Bisaro.
Thank you, Madam Chair. A couple of comments and questions here. In terms of the Mackenzie Valley Highway, it certainly seems to be a project which has now become a priority of this government.
Is there any money in this budget that is being, I guess for a lack of a better way of putting it, earmarked for the Mackenzie Valley Highway? Thank you.
Thank you, Ms. Bisaro. Minister Beaulieu.
Thank you, Madam Chair. The main money that we hope to spend on the Mackenzie Valley Highway is in a separate proposal to Canada under the national Infrastructure Fund. We are also seeking some money from CanNor, which is another pot of money that’s outside of the O and M that we’re discussing here today.
If I heard the Minister correctly, then, the funding for the Mackenzie Valley Highway is totally outside of this budget. I’m wondering about the Building Canada Plan. Is any of the Building Canada Plan money intended for the Mackenzie Valley Highway? Thank you.
Madam Chair, there’s one outstanding proposal from the Sahtu referred to as Canyon Creek proposal. That is something that could possibly end up in the Building Canada Fund, Corridors for Canada III. In that proposal, if they build a Canyon Creek Road, then Canyon Creek Road would be on the same alignment as the Mackenzie Valley Highway.
I didn’t hear any reference to the Building Canada Plan, so can I just get confirmation that the Building Canada Plan money is not going into the Mackenzie Valley Highway? Thank you.
Madam Chair, there will be three or four bundles on the overall plan, Building Canada Plan. In the first bundle, it will be discussed in this session. There is no money in that bundle for the Mackenzie Valley Highway.
Thanks to the Minister. Three or four bundles… Does a bundle equate to a fiscal year, or is this three or four bundles in the ‘15-16 fiscal year? Thanks.
Madam Chair, the bundles are more than one fiscal year, but I’ll have the deputy minister respond so we can provide a little more detail on how the bundles work.
Thank you, Mr. Beaulieu. Mr. Neudorf.
Thank you, Madam Chair. The bundles are really for administrative purposes. They will allow us to bundle several different projects together as long as they have some common themes. That eases the administrative process for both ourselves and the federal government to get those projects approved.
At the end of the day, it’s about $300 million for DOT over 10 years underneath Building Canada Plan. We believe it will be three or four bundles of projects, the first bundle of which we hope to bring forward in the supp document later this session. Thank you, Madam Chair.
Thank you, Mr. Neudorf. Ms. Bisaro.
I’m trying to get at how the Mackenzie Valley Highway is going to be financed. There’s no money in this next bundle of Building Canada Plan money, but is it conceivable that there will be money for the Mackenzie Valley Highway coming from the Building Canada Plan sometime in the next period of years in these bundles as they come forward? Thank you.
Thank you, Ms. Bisaro. Minister Beaulieu.
Thank you, Madam Chair. The Building Canada Plan that we have been working with that we’re getting very close to rolling out does not include any expenditures to the Mackenzie Valley Highway. The national Infrastructure Fund, which is also under the umbrella of the Building Canada Plan, is again a different pot of money coming from the federal government. That is where we have our proposal. We’re trying to draw down some of that money. That is a $700 million proposal that we put in front of the federal government all to go towards the Mackenzie Valley Highway.
Thanks to the Minister. My other question in this area has to do with the highway, the roadway from the intersection at the Explorer Hotel and the now extinct gas station and then heading out towards Niven Lake. It’s been discussed for quite some time. By quite some time I mean quite a few years. There’s a great concern for the people that live in Niven Lake and walk to work and downtown that it’s reasonably unsafe. There’s concern over tourists who are walking from downtown to the Visitors Centre. There’s no place for people to cross from one side of the road to the other.
My understanding is that the GNWT has been working with the City of Yellowknife to try and figure out, first of all, ownership of the roadway but also to figure out how to effect a decent pedestrian crossing, a safe pedestrian crossing somewhere between Niven Lake and the four-way downtown, whether it be a crossing at Niven Lake itself or whether it be a crossing here at the Assembly out at the highway.
My understanding is that, in discussions with the city, there was some research on the road that needed to be done. The road needs to be upgraded to a certain standard before the city will take it over. There was some research that needed to be done before the upgrading could be done. Can I get an indication from the department whether or not that research has been done and where we are at in the transfer of ownership of this piece of road? Thank you.
Thank you, Ms. Bisaro. Mr. Neudorf.
Thank you, Madam Chair. We are working and talking to the city about that stretch of road, and the long-term goal would be to turn it over to the city because it’s becoming more of a municipal road than it is a highway as development occurs around it. We have undertaken quite a few improvements to that stretch of road to recognize the fact that there are pedestrians on there. Lights have been installed. Speed limits have been reduced. There are extra wide shoulders on that stretch of road.
Ideally, we would come up with a solution for improving pedestrian access so that pedestrians could get right off of the highway itself. It would be our goal to get the pedestrians off the highway itself, so we are talking to the city about potentially doing that.
One of the hesitations on behalf of the city is just the long-term rehabilitation, reconstruction that would be required for that highway. We have recently installed a test section on that road to see if this new technology will help stabilize it and take care of some of the longer term reconstruction that might be required on some of the settlement areas. That effort is still ongoing. Thank you, Madam Chair.
Thank you, Mr. Neudorf. Ms. Bisaro.
Thanks, Madam Chair. I appreciate the information from the deputy minister, but the effort’s been ongoing for a very long time. Is there any end in sight? Obviously, the answer to my question about the research is that no, it hasn’t been done. It’s in the throes of being done through this test section, but is there any kind of a time frame that the Minister or the department can give me as to when we will get to some point of being able to turn this piece of road over? Thank you.
Thank you, Ms. Bisaro. Minister Beaulieu.
Madam Chair, we do not have a time frame as to when this solution will come about.
I have to reiterate that this is an accident waiting to happen. I appreciate the work that has been done that Mr. Neudorf pointed out. It definitely is safer than it used to be, but there is, at this point, no safe place for pedestrians to cross. I think it is something that this government needs to take a stronger position in, I guess. I would encourage the Minister to see if there isn’t some money to be found in the ’15-16 budget that could do whatever work is required to turn this over sooner rather than later. The fact that there’s no timeline is very concerning to me.
The solution would most likely be a capital solution, and we will work with the city and see if there is a possibility that we could bring something forward in the next capital plan. We know that almost any solution would be an expensive solution. Any time you have people crossing a highway, walking across a highway, it‘s not a safe thing to be doing. So, it‘s a solution that will likely be costly if we want to safely cross a highway.
Thank you, Mr. Beaulieu. Ms. Bisaro, your time has expired. I‘m going to next go to Mr. Bromley.
Thank you, Madam Chair. I appreciate the discussion that‘s just been had and I‘d like to just make a couple of comments and ask a question. First of all, I appreciate the deputy minister‘s recognition of the safety issue and his mention that really the best thing is to get people off the road, like, right away from that. There‘s no safe place to cross, Ms. Bisaro and the Minister are right, but there‘s also no safe place to walk on that highway and there are no options, so people have to and they are doing that. So it‘s a very unsafe situation. I know the deputy minister and Minister realize that.
Niven Lake is a young neighbourhood that‘s growing quickly. Given that we‘re between a rock and a hard spot in terms of time and expense and the schedule, despite the eight years of bringing this forward in the House, can the Minister work with the City of Yellowknife on the pedestrian issue and establish a walking trail off the highway and provide a simple pedestrian-operated, button-operated yellow light that will alert people who want to cross, probably located right at the Legislative Assembly junction with our access road and the Niven to town highway.
I don‘t see this being tremendously expensive, but it‘s a solution that could be done on a shorter term. Finally, with respect to the expense, I believe the City of Yellowknife would be more than happy and more than interested to have some discussions on putting a simple interim solution like that in place. I would imagine a walking path would be useful in the longer term as well.
I know this has been raised repeatedly by the city as wanting to do something. They say they‘re harried, they‘re frustrated in the transfer that hasn‘t taken place where they‘re waiting for that to happen. So there is an opportunity here. It‘s a modest opportunity to deal with the safety issue both for walkers, pedestrians, young people, young families and the crossing. Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Bromley, Minister Beaulieu.
Thank you, Madam Chair. We will work with the city to try to find a safer way for pedestrians to come into the city for work and back to Niven. We know that the ideal situation, of course, and the safest situation is for the pedestrians just to stay on the city roads and come into town on the other side of Niven, recognizing that‘s a long ways, especially for the people that live on this end of Niven. But it’s just that we are finding that any time you cross, we create an unsafe… Whether we’re crossing right at Niven or crossing at the Legislative Assembly, both of the crossings on that road would not be a safe place to cross. Nowhere is safe to cross. If you end up across, then you can have some pedestrians that come through by the Visitors Centre; however, alternatively trying not to have individuals cross the road at all would mean that the pedestrian pass would have to be on the Explorer side of the road and we know there‘s a huge cliff there. We‘d have to get around that somehow in a safe way. So, I think it will require some money and some consultation with the city. Like I said, the alternative is for the people to go the long way around, but I don‘t think people wish to do that so we‘re trying to find a solution.
I know the Minister is capable of putting all kinds of barriers up here but we need something done now. This has accelerated and exacerbated itself to the point where, you know, this is overdue. I realize that we can‘t do the perfect thing, so I‘m talking about an interim solution and I think a yellow flashing light… There are no obstructions, there‘s plenty of time for people to see those. I‘m not an expert so I‘m just giving you my opinion here, but something in the interim, in my mind, could be done at relatively modest expense. Recognizing that we are talking years now, still, after eight years of discussing this to get something actually done.
I appreciate the research that‘s been done and the intent to get things done, but people are really saying, we need this now and we are so lucky now. People approached me, both pedestrians and drivers. Drivers are equally upset because they are having close calls. Who wants to run over anybody? So this is a real issue and I would appreciate the Minister’s best efforts to get an interim solution in there while we wait for the perfect solution.
We will have our engineers look at this again along with the city and there will be some question on whether or not a flashing yellow light is a safe way to cross the road. It depends on the condition of the road and the lighting. I know that we have good lighting at Niven and if that is the solution, if they are able to cross the road and safely walk as far as the Legislative Assembly entrance, we will look at that along with the city.
Thank you, Minister Beaulieu. Highways, operations expenditure summary, $66.420 million.
Agreed.
Agreed. Thank you. Highways, grants, contributions and transfers, grants, $200,000.
Agreed.
Highways, active positions, information item on page 467.
Agreed.
Agreed. Thank you. Page 469, marine, operations expenditure summary, $7.418 million. Ms. Bisaro.
Thanks, Madam Chair. I just have one quick comment here and a question, I guess, about the expenditures. But I want to add my voice to those who talked about the need to dredge both the Hay River harbour and the Mackenzie River. I know that it’s a federal responsibility but I think it is something we as a government, as a territorial government, are going to have to seriously consider biting the bullet and funding within and then maybe going after the feds for some money, because this is only going to get worse, it’s not going to get better.
My formal question to the Minister is whether or not there is any money in this budget. Will there be any consideration to put money in this budget for dredging either Hay River harbour or the Mackenzie River itself in the ’15-16 year? Thank you.
Thank you, Ms. Bisaro. Minister Beaulieu.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman. There is no money in this budget for dredging Hay River, the port or the rest of the Hay River.
So, will the Minister be considering trying to find some money to do some dredging in the ’15-16 summer?
HON. TOM BEAULIEU:
