Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, in follow-up to my Member's statement I have a few questions for the Minister of Transportation. I would like the ask the Minister: what is the life span of the Louis Cardinal ferry and what is the plan for its ends of life? Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Masi. Minister of Transportation.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. The particular ferry, the Louis Cardinal ferry, is a short-trip, fresh water vessel. They tend to operate for many years. Right across the country, anything that is operating in fresh water tends to get 60-plus years of operation out of it. The other side of that vessel, though, is the mechanical side of it and the hull maintenance. Those things have a much shorter maintenance life, but we have a scheduled maintenance plan, when to undertake those required rehabilitations, and we continue to do so.
He asked another question. There were actually two questions in there. The Louis Cardinal is expected to operate, we suspect, for at least another 15 years. Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
How much would it cost to retrofit the Merv Hardie compared to acquiring a new vessel?
The Merv Hardie ferry is a little different beast than the Louis Cardinal. It has a different size and shape to it, and the hull is not actually suitable to replace the Louis Cardinal ferry. The Louis Cardinal is actually a shallow-draft vessel that is a little different in river conditions than it was here on the Fort Providence section. No amount of money would ever fix that thing to make it viable to use it for the Louis Cardinal.
With that being said, to replace the Louis Cardinal ferry in today's dollars, if we were to do it right today, it would cost this government roughly between $10 and $15 million to replace that ferry.
The future prosperity of the Northwest Territories depends on a strong transportation system. How does the Northwest Territories transportation strategy consider their placement of ferries?
As I previously said, the department has programs in place to do maintenance and replacement of the ferries. We want to make sure that everything is safe and efficient and operating going forward, of course. In the long term, all ferries could be replaced by permanent bridges, which the Member also alluded to in his statement today. This would require significant investment from this government to do that.
Masi. Oral questions. Member for Mackenzie Delta.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. The Minister just led me on to my next question here. How much do ferry operations cost compared to a bridge? Thank you, Mr. Speaker.
Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Operating ferries and ice bridges in the Member's area, with a little bit of lower volume of traffic compared to the Providence crossing, which has a high significant volume of traffic, the department has not developed a cost estimate to construct a bridge at the Tsiigehtchic crossing or the Peel. Those would be significant investments. The Deh Cho Bridge cost $200 million. From my recollection, to operate the Louis Cardinal ferry costs over a million dollars a year. You do the math. It is not viable to put a bridge in there at this point.
Masi. Oral questions. Member for Frame Lake.
