Transit plan good news for city: Mayor

City staff want to start building a light-rail transit system in just three years.

By Rob Faulkner, Last Updated Tuesday, September 23, 2008

Published in the Hamilton Spectator on Tuesday, September 23, 2008.

City staff want to start building a light-rail transit system in just three years.

They'll find out this morning if they can start breaking out the construction equipment.

Metrolinx, the provincial agency charged with designing public transit thoughout southern Ontario, will release its draft regional transportation plan and investment strategy at 10 a.m. Mayor Fred Eisenberger has seen it and, while he refused to reveal details, said Hamilton will be happy with the news.

Watch thespec.com for details as they become available.

The big local question: Will Hamilton light-rail transit -- which city planners estimate could cost $1.1 billion to build -- get OK'd as Metrolinx plots the rollout of the $17.5-billion MoveOntario 2020 plan?

"I anticipate that Hamilton will like the plan," said a restrained Rob MacIsaac, the former Burlington mayor now chair of Metrolinx.

"It's an important step forward for the whole region in understanding the routes we see as being of regional significance, and there will be a number of routes that are significant for Hamilton's purposes," MacIsaac said. Last year's MoveOntario 2020 announcement said $300 million was available for Hamilton rapid transit. Timelines are expected in October, MacIsaac said, so today is a day for strategic answers.

The city wants a route with rail westbound on King and eastbound on Main; it would send rail south on James, up the Claremont Access, and to the airport on Upper James. The Claremont is still being studied, for cost and its grade.

The city estimates it will cost $160 an hour per vehicle to run a street-level, light-rail system. A bus rapid transit system would cost $480 million to build.

Jill Stephen, manager of strategic planning, said staff work sped up after an invite to see Metrolinx in July 2007, to discuss hopes for local transportation.

There have been feasibility studies, internal meetings, meetings with Metrolinx, staff lunch and learn sessions, even a four-day road trip to Charlotte, N.C., Portland, Ore., and Calgary.

"We told (Metrolinx) that the public here wants light rail, and that our council has given us approval to look exclusively at light rail," said Stephen, crediting the community group Hamilton Light Rail for helping city staff with research and input.

If it's part of the 2009-13 Metrolinx budget, city staff say construction could start in 2011 or later.

Earlier this month, a leaked draft plan for spending $55 billion over 25 years to fix Toronto-Hamilton congestion included all-day GO train service between the cities every 15 minutes and rapid transit lines here. MacIsaac downplayed the leak, and said it was not the most recent version.

Ryan McGreal is editor of the Raise the Hammer blog and member of Hamilton Light Rail, a group formed a year ago out of a feeling that the city wasn't pursuing LRT and settling for bus rapid transit.

"The problem in Canada is that we have very little experience with light rail transit, so people around here tend to think of the old Toronto streetcars," he said. "And there has been a sense in Hamilton for a long time that our expectations have been diminished."

But, he said, the city soon shifted its work into high gear.

Nicholas Kevlahan, a McMaster University math professor and co-founder of Hamilton Light Rail, said today may see the start of a city-changing initiative.

"Metrolinx's announcement is key and, if they do it properly, will be transforming Hamilton and the GTA in the next 20 years," he said.