Regional Councillor Wendy Stewart's

October 4, 1999

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1. Municipal Restructuring

Municipal Affairs and Housing Minister, Steve Gilchrist, has announced that after 90 days for local discussion and consultation, led by Special Advisor Glen Shortliffe, Ottawa-Carleton will be restructured and the number of politicians will be reduced.

Plans to consult the public and develop recommendations are underway. Interested residents are invited to submit their views in writing by October 22^nd to Mr. Glen Shortliffe, Suite 500, 1547 Merivale Road, Nepean, Ont. K2G 4V3, by E-mail to glen.shortliffe@mah.gov.on.ca or by fax to 225-0319.

Two public meetings have been scheduled - for October 27 to hear from rural residents and November 3^rd to take place in the City of Ottawa (times and locations to be announced). Invitations have gone out to area municipal Councils and Regional Council to submit detailed briefs, including financial data, and to meet with Special Advisor Shortliffe.

In late October, Mr. Shortliffe will begin to prepare recommendations for the provincial government which will be submitted on November 26^th recommending a specific reform model and implementation plan.

A discussion paper prepared by the Centre on Governance of the University of Ottawa entitled "Governance - The Borough Model: Municipal Restructuring for Ottawa" was released in late August and a copy is available for perusal at this meeting.

2. Community Forums across Ottawa-Carleton

In conjunction with the above announcements on restructuring municipal government, residents of River Ward are invited to attend a community forum on October 18^th , from 5 to 8 p.m., at the Carleton Heights Community Centre, 1665 Apeldoorn Avenue. Regional Chair Bob Chiarelli will cohost this meeting. Residents will have an opportunity to ask questions and discuss a variety of topics.

RMOC is recommending the lease of the former Drummond Pit, located at Riverside Drive and Hunt Club, to the City of Ottawa for the purpose of developing and managing a public park, for a total consideration of $1.00.

This parcel of land was expropriated in 1983 for the Hunt Club Road bridge and the reconstruction of Riverside Drive. Approximately 8 acres remain and has been vacant since construction of the bridge was completed. Borrow material from other regional projects was used to raise the grade and tidy up the site in the mid 1990’s.

This entire property is designated as "Waterfront Open Space" in the Regional Official Plan and "Open Space Area" in the Ottawa Official Plan.

This proposal calls for a lease for $1.00 for a 20 year period, with a renewal clause for a further 20 year term if both parties agree.

I support a land swap for this parcel with the neighbouring land (owned by J. Taggart and adjacent to the Quinterra-Riverwood community) so that the park can be beside the community that will use it. Both city and regional staffs have been asked by their respective Councillors to expedite this transfer.

Council has voted to approve the light rail pilot project as part of its public transportation system. Sleek looking diesel light rail Bombardier trains will run on existing CP track between Bayview and Greenboro with five stations at Bayview, Carling Avenue, Carleton University, Confederation Heights and Greenboro. Operations will be fully integrated with the Transitway and bus services.

As your Councillor, I have been supportive of the concept of light rail until now. I voted to derail this project for the following reasons:

• At $16 million, it’s too expensive a project at this time of fiscal uncertainty, changing municipal mandates and the already high tax burden shouldered by residents of Ottawa-Carleton. Some capital and operating costs have also been deferred or contracted out (tax and duties, maintenance) bringing the project well over the budget that was agreed upon at the preliminary approval stage. I believe this will be a giant money pit for years to come. (If the "pilot" goes ahead after 2 years, additional costs include purchasing trains at $13.3 million, option to purchase the rail corridor $7 million, rehabilitation of the rail line at $15 million and so on.)
• This is not a viable route for enough users. It is hardly accessible to most of Hunt Club and Riverside Park, yet is expected to pull many of its riders from our communities. In fact, 80% of expected users are already taking the bus. Over the life of the 2 year pilot, only 1,000 to 1,300 riders will be new transit users. (The cost per new rider has been estimated as high as $24,000!) Let’s hope bus service will not be reduced west of the Airport Parkway to help make light rail quotas.
• There are still unanswered questions about noise, vibration and pollution that may affect nearby residents. During the environmental assessment stage, only the 2 car train was studied, and no noise attenuation was needed. Since then we have learned that the 3 car train (ordered) may have noise emissions requiring either modifications or the erection of noise barriers. (Add costs of $1.3 million)

Marketing and Other Initiatives in Support of Major Service Changes - August 29^th

Fall services changes went into effect on Sunday, August 29^th and in preparation for these changes, OC Transpo produced a special edition of "Transpo Express" which gave a quick overview of the route changes and which appeared in operators’ bins. A special student information area was made available on the OC Transpo web site at www.octranspo.com which featured every high school, middle school and university and college on their system. Students can click their school and get detailed route and schedule information for a specific school. Photo ID teams fanned out across the regional to educational institutions to get student photos done. This year, all full-time students were eligible for an annual pass, which was sold at all customer service centres.

Transit shelter ads and university ads were also part of the marketing mix. Radio and print ads began on August 25^th and more than 200,000 system maps were distributed by The Ottawa Citizen and Le Droit. A community door-to-door pilot marketing team averaged 75 households per evening and reception was reported to be extremely warm.

Based on very little negative feed-back received in my office, I am assuming that the huge service changes recently implemented went reasonable well.

Ridership results for the lst half of this year (January through June) showed an increase of 3.56 percent over the same period of time last year.

On Saturday, September 11^th, at about 11:35 a.m. on Riverside Drive at Mooney’s Bay, an incident occurred whereby the outer back left dual wheel strayed from an OC Transpo bus and rolled across Riverside Drive without causing injury to anyone thankfully. Although this was an isolated incident, as required by law, it was reported to the Ontario Ministry of Transportation. A full internal investigation was carried out, which started with a check of buses with a similar style wheel. OC Transpo is mandated to perform a battery of safety checks on all vehicles. In addition, every bus undergoes a visual check every night - including looking for loose wheel nuts. The internal investigation will include a full review of all procedures.

6. 1999 Resurfacing Program

In June I reported that Riverside Drive from Uplands Drive to Brookfield Road was scheduled for resurfacing this year. My office has received a few calls expressing concern for extend road rehabilitation on Riverside Drive this past summer. Regional Government subscribes to the public tender process and in doing so the Region relies on the contractor to schedule the work so that the finished product meets the specifications attributable to the work. Alternations to the contractor’s schedule usually results in increases to the contract price. The public tender process continues to be the best method of executing the work at the best price.

In regard to the work carried out the week of September 20^th, it was done at the expense of the contractor and it was necessary due to deficiencies in the iron work adjustments. The milling operation is followed by iron work adjustment which requires that each frame and cover be lifted and re-set to the new gradients after the asphalt has been placed. Surface iron adjustment is a tedious, slow process and in many cases, the top of the concrete structure must be repaired before the surface iron can be re-set.

In conclusion, all work is now complete and to the satisfaction of the Regional Overlay Engineer.

The Region’s Year 2000 Program office has confirmed that contingency plans developed to protect essential services from potential internal and external matters related to the Year 2000 problem have been finalized.

For more information on this issue, contact the Region’s web site at www.rmoc.on.ca/2000. For information on how you can best prepare your own family for any emergency situation including the millennium transition, consult the READY 2000 Emergency Preparedness Guide available from the Regional Headquarters’ Information Desk, the Region’s Emergency Measures Unit office or local fire stations.

Please do not hesitate to call my office if there are questions or comments on these, or any other matters of a regional interest.