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June
1998 Newsletter
Progress
in Stopping the Expressway
The
battle to save the valley is clearly gaining momentum. The
May 5th mass rally at Hamilton City Hall had about 1500
participants. Over 1200 of them provided their names and
phone numbers to Friends of Red Hill. This was the
largest rally at City Hall in recent memory. Even though
some parts of the media tried to downplay its significance,
all the members of Regional Council know exactly what happened.
At least one councillor has informed us that he is switching
to an anti-expressway position.
Four
days after the rally, on May 9th, representatives of Friends
of Red Hill and two other organizations made formal
presentations about the expressway issue to the federal
Standing Committee on Fisheries and Oceans. This is the
Commons committee that oversees the work of the Department
of Fisheries and Oceans (DFO).
By
the end of May, DFO officials had decided to begin the federal
environmental assessment of the expressway project.
Also
in May, it became clear that DFO officials had derailed
the Region's plans to start construction of the expressway
this fall. As noted in the media, the earliest date for
a construction start has been shifted from September 1998
to June 1999. More recently, regional officials are predicting
they won't be able to start until August 1999. These estimates
may change further depending on the federal assessment process.
The
Region had planned to tender contracts in July of this year
for the Mud Street to Greenhill Avenue portion of the expressway
and begin construction in September or October. They apparently
thought they could do this before asking for a formal authorization
under the Fisheries Act, since the expressway doesn't start
crossing the creek until north of Greenhill. Such a move
would be clearly illegal under the Canadian Environmental
Assessment Act which requires that an assessment be conducted
"before any irrevocable decisions are made" on a project.
DFO has now apparently made this clear to the Region, and
consequently the construction schedules have been substantially
set back. Regional officials have tried to conceal their
defeat on this issue by claiming that their intention was
really only to start building the connection between the
Lincoln Alexander Parkway and Mud Street and Paramount Drive.
They are falsely calling this part of the north-south expressway,
when it is really quite separate from the valley and should
have been built before the Linc was opened last fall.
The
Region had apparently hoped that ending the Linc at Dartnall
Road would create a huge traffic crisis and fuel demands
to "complete" a "road to nowhere". Instead, the traffic
crisis appeared at the other end of the Linc where it connects
to the 403. That crisis has forced the construction of a
temporary emergency lane, and the launching of work to build
a new interchange there. Ministry of Transporation officials
had warned the Region this would be necessary before opening
the Linc, but the Region disagreed.
May
also saw the collapse of the most recent merger scheme and
has forced the re-opening of the regional budget, putting
borrowing for the expressway back on the table (see article
4). Events in June have continued the dizzying pace set
in May. The month started with the release of a federal
report listing Hamilton as the third worst affected by poor
air quality, and noting that one additional person in the
city dies on every bad smog day.
This
was followed by public revelation of the DFO decision to
start an environmental assessment on the expressway. On
June 10, Friends of Red Hill released a legal opinion
prepared by the Canadian Environmental Law Association which
sets out directions for the content and process of this
assessment.
On
the same day, a media release also emerged from the office
of the regional chairman which claimed 81% support for the
north-south expressway. Friends of Red Hill exposed the
deception in this release the following day. The next day,
Decima Research took the highly unusual step of publicly
disavowing responsibility for the chairman's interpretation
of the survey. A Spectator story on June 12 cited
polling experts who described the survey as a joke and an
attempt to rig the results. As a result, Chairman Cooke
was forced to publicly retract his false claims (see following
article).
As
this drama unfolded, the Region released an "Executive Summary"
of the expected impacts of the expressway. While it confirmed
what Friends of Red Hill has been warning of, the
picture it paints is actually much worse. At the same time,
the document is full of unsupported claims that will eventually
be proven to be false or misleading. The first example of
this hit the Spectator on June 20 when McMaster researchers
pointed out that their research was being misrepresented.
The Region had made the ridiculous claim that building the
7.5 km north-south expressway would reduce vehicle emissions
in the entire Region by up to 16% (see third article). Stay
tuned for more Regional "clarifications".
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