Calgary city council votes to wind down Green Line LRT project

Calgary city council has voted to wind down the Green Line LRT project.

Councillors voted 10-5 in favour of the motion on Tuesday during a city council meeting where members were discussing and debating the fallout of losing Alberta government funding for the project.

Council approved an amendment put forward by Ward 8 Coun. Courtney Walcott that would draft a clear set of criteria for the city to consider if they were to engage with the province on a future LRT line.

The city will begin unwinding the Green Line starting Wednesday. The move is set to cost over $2.1 billion and could affect over 1,000 jobs

Transportation Minister Devin Dreeshen penned a letter to Gondek in early September saying the province would pull its $1.53 billion in funding from the $6.2-billion project unless the city rerouted the line and extended it farther south.

Council approved an updated, shortened line in July, with an added $700 million in costs to municipal coffers.

Mayor Jyoti Gondek has said such proposals from the province have been studied and rejected, and subsequent meetings with Premier Danielle Smith’s United Conservative Party government haven’t moved the two parties to a compromise.

City officials and Green Line board members have said more than $1.3 billion has already been spent on land acquisition, utility work and new rail vehicles, and in new numbers revealed Tuesday, estimated a wind down could cost another $850 million.

Coun. Sonya Sharp pitched an unsuccessful motion to pause the wind-down to come up with a new project plan along with the province and federal government.

“I don’t believe that winding down this project is financially responsible,” she said, adding that doing so will probably “kill it forever.”

City officials said a pause would incur up to $30 million per month in costs.

What’s next for the Green Line project?

Shortly after council voted to wind down the project, they voted in favour of requesting the province form a working group with Green Line funding partners.

Dreeshen has declined to say whether the province would backstop liabilities for delayed or cancelled contracts, but reiterated that he is working to get alternative proposals from an independent engineering firm.

“We will continue to collaborate with the City of Calgary and our federal partners to ensure an orderly transition from an expensive and high-risk project with extensive tunnelling to a new and longer above-ground alignment that will benefit many more Calgarians,” he said in a Monday statement.

Gondek said the only way forward is for the provincial government to oversee whatever project proposals it comes back with.

She added that the funding agreement for the Green Line with the federal and provincial governments expires March 31.