Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I’ve had a theme of safety today, so I’m going to continue on this theme with the Minister of Transportation.
As we indicated today, the first day of November, we are hoping the opening of the much anticipated Deh Cho Bridge is going to be happening in this month. As we’ve heard in our dialogue earlier in some of our capital discussions, we are dealing with some temporary issues as we prepare to go across this bridge in a degree of safety. What I mean by that is we have temporary electrical set up, we have temporary aviation marine lights hooked up, we have temporary navigation, we have temporary accent lighting, we have temporary conduit or conduit that needs to be done. More importantly, we don’t have an active or operating emergency phone system. These are all not actively in a final state.
Can the Minister assure that, because these are obviously requirements for safety and for the completion of this bridge, that indeed if this bridge will be open here at the end of November, are NWT residents safe? Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Thank you, Mr. Dolynny. The honourable Minister of Transportation, Mr. Ramsay.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Safety, of course, is the number one concern by the Department of Transportation. When we open the Deh Cho Bridge, it will open this month, and I will have an announcement next week to that regard.
We take safety into consideration. There are a number of engineers. We have project managers. We are not going to open the Deh Cho Bridge if it’s safe for traffic to cross that bridge.
There are a number of things that will be temporary. We have an electrical contract that we’ve let and hope to get that work done as soon as the weather permits in the spring.
The Member is correct; we will be without an emergency phone on the bridge for seven to eight months, but there will be a phone there eventually. Thank you.
Mr. Speaker, this is going to be our first year of operation, or anticipated first year of operation with this bridge and we are going to be learning lots of new things about a bridge of that magnitude over a body of water, icing, snow cover. If anyone has been down there to see it, it’s quite a large angle of inclination, so we could be running into issues of sliding, small accidents and things of that nature. If we run into a problem in our first season of operation, as the Minister indicated, we don’t have a phone. There is no emergency phone to call.
What does the department suggest we do if, indeed, we have a problem on this bridge? Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Mr. Speaker, we would anticipate that there wouldn’t be any incidents this coming winter on the structure. It’s located in close proximity to the community of Fort Providence. If you had an accident on the highway system between, say, Edzo and Fort Providence somewhere near Chan Lake, you’re a lot closer to help on the Deh Cho Bridge itself. So we don’t see that as a big issue. We don’t see that as an impediment to opening the bridge this month. The bridge will open and it will be safe to traverse. Thank you.
Thank you. Obviously, these deficiencies or these temporary systems, including emergency phone, were deemed important for engineers to keep it as a permanent part of our bridge. So I’m really at odds as to what are we going to do for our first year, but that leads me to my other question.
Because we’re in a temporary state, we have temporary systems in place, we don’t have an emergency phone that will be active, we obviously have to carry insurance or liability as a department, as a government. Would these deficiencies or non-compliance to a so-called final inspection report or a final signing off of the project, are these deficiencies going to affect our liability and our insurance? Thank you.
Thank you. We need to celebrate the opening of this bridge this month and we’ll do that. As to whether or not not having a phone on the bridge and operating some temporary lighting this coming winter will impact our insurance premiums that we pay, that is information that I’d be happy to get for the Member and other Members of the House. Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Ramsay. Final, short supplementary, Mr. Dolynny.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. I think many people are quite curious and I’ll definitely have to ask this last question. As we’ve talked about the final completion, we heard about an RFP that has been issued; we’re not sure if it’s closed or not. Can the Minister indicate if this is going to be new monies, potentially, that will be asked in the upcoming next budget, or is this something that would be included in the overall project design and scope and budget? Thank you.
Thank you. That contract, that would be money that is included in the overall project cost. It wouldn’t be new money and it certainly would be included, and that is related to electrical type of work on the bridge itself. Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Ramsay. The Member for Weledeh, Mr. Bromley.
