Both parties have committed to widening Highway 1 to Chilliwack, but diverge on promises for rapid transit for the region.
B.C. Conservative Leader John Rustad kicked off duelling transportation announcements Thursday, unveiling a list of campaign promises to “get B.C. moving” that include widening Highway 1 to six lanes all the way to Chilliwack, extending SkyTrain to Newton in Surrey, and expanding the Pattullo Bridge replacement to six lanes.
NDP Leader David Eby, in presenting his party’s full platform in Surrey, promised to build SkyTrain’s Broadway Subway extension all the way to the University of B.C., start building toward rapid transit to the North Shore and add commuter rail services in the Fraser Valley.
Neither party attached price tags or timelines to their proposals, but, just from promises, Fraser Valley-based political scientist Hamish Telford observed that “the costs for these developments and upgrades are enormous.”
Price tags promise to be in the billions of dollars, judging by projects already under construction, such as the $2.83-billion Broadway subway expansion, whose completion has been delayed by two years to 2027, and SkyTrain’s Surrey extension, which is also delayed by two years and facing a 50-per-cent increase in its budget to $6 billion.
Both projects required heavy spending from the federal government to proceed.
“Obviously, the parties recognize that they have to speak to the concerns of voters in the outer suburbs,” said Telford, a professor at University of the Fraser Valley.
“It’s all about moving people,” although by appealing to different demographics in the population, Telford added.
“The Conservatives, I think, are perhaps targeted toward older, suburban families,” whereas the NDP is focused on “younger families and how we might move them,” Telford said.
Rustad rolled out his party’s platform under the slogan “Get B.C. Moving,” to start on a “transformative infrastructure and transportation plan.”
Other pieces of it include identifying and rebuilding Highway 1 exits and interchanges, replacing the old Ironworkers Memorial Bridge to the North Shore — with expanded capacity for cars and transit — and a promise to expedite a replacement for the George Massey Tunnel with “a new high-capacity crossing,” but without specifying whether that would be a bridge or a new tunnel.
He accused the NDP government of neglecting infrastructure over the last seven years which has created “bottlenecks, delays and inefficiencies.”
Eby also makes a commitment to widening Highway 1 to Chilliwack, but the platform’s proposals lean on elements such as extending the West Coast Express to the eastern Fraser Valley city, developing a business plan for other commuter rail for destination such as Squamish, and expanding express bus services between cities elsewhere.
The NDP’s promises on transit extend to expanding and strengthening transit through TransLink and its Mayors’ Council’s “access for everyone plan,” besides throwing support to TransLink’s proposal to expand North Shore RapidBus service to Metrotown with the goal of turning it into bus rapid transit and then some form of rapid transit.
The commitments that all parties have now made to transit services have caught the attention of TransLink’s Mayors’ Council, which made its own statement Thursday encouraging the leaders to expand on those proposals.
“Clearly, provincial leaders have been hearing from the public that investment in transit needs to be a priority for the next government,” said council chair Brad West, who is also mayor of Port Coquitlam.
Green Leader Sonia Furstenau was the first to offer a major commitment to public transportation by promising to make transit a free service across the province a cornerstone of her party’s platform, even before the official campaign started.
On Thursday, Rustad promised to deal with what he called B.C.’s “public transit crisis,” by prioritizing regional transit, Fraser Valley commuter rail, and expanded transit on the Sea to Sky corridor.
He also promised to “fully (fund)” TransLink for two years while conducting an audit on its finances with a view to reforming its funding model “to ensure long-term stability.”
West said the council looks “forward to hearing more specifics from the parties about how they will fix TransLink’s broken funding model.”
TransLink, for the last year, has said it faces a $600-million-per-year financial void starting in 2026 without a new funding model with secure revenue sources and warned earlier this year it would have to cut bus service in half without one.
The attention to public transit was also welcomed by advocate groups, such as SkyTrain for Surrey, which wants to see 50 kilometres of rapid-transit expansion to South Surrey, to Guildford and into the Fraser Valley and Scott Road in Delta on three new routes.
In a statement, SkyTrain for Surrey said it “applauds the B.C. Conservative party’s commitment to building a King George SkyTrain line to Surrey’s Newton Town Centre.”
Denis Agar, executive-director of the pro-transit non-profit group Movement, said, “There are exciting things in all three platforms.” He noted that Movement “strongly (supports)” extending the Broadway subway line and intercity bus networks across the province, both parts of the NDP platform.
Movement, however, remains concerned that neither the NDP or Conservative platforms take overcrowding on transit services elsewhere in the province seriously enough.