Windsor/Detroit's Classic Megaproject

It's a shame that no one on the US side has any guts. It is true as well that no one on this side of the river has any guts either. If they had, I would not be up at 4AM in the morning with my mind racing after attending the DRIC session and after listening to the Transport Canada doublespeak at the Senate hearings last night (more on this once I get the full transcript!)

The Danish Professor, if he were here, would be laughing himself silly. He has another chapter in his book. Our border crossing has become a true classic MEGAPROJECT. It is out of control!

We read the following in the Star story yesterday, "Michigan on side." This statement was supposed to have been read out at a public meeting last week but was pulled at the last minute:

• "The administration [ie the Governor] and the department leadership [of MDOT] have growing concerns about the direction of the DRIC study and the delivery of a timely, affordable solution to the border issues. These concerns include the ultimate cost of a new bridge, the community disruption that its construction would cause and how quickly it can be completed...
  
  State budget and revenue forecasts were cited as prompting Michigan's withdrawal."
  

Oh if only it had been done, we would not be having this ridiculous charade being carried on. Now that we have some idea as to costs, this whole process is absurd. What is being proposed will cost taxpayers dearly by the time it is done. Maybe a crossing here was never to be completed but killed so that our region will die as Sarnia is being built up with hundreds of millions of new taxpayer (not P3) dollars. They are to be used to fix up the Blue Water Bridge to improve their traffic flow thereby making their region more attractive for new investment. And at our expense!

Perhaps we are being groomed with our future to be the call centre capital of Ontario with our employees in Windsor being paid minimum wage, sort of the Third World of Ontario.

Is it up now to the Canadian side to do something? Did the Governor decide not to be the one to kill DRIC since she learned the costs and figured out to let the Canadians be the fall-guy this time around? She took the heat before when she acted unilaterally in killing the Downriver bridges.

I have shown above a chart of costs. As Gord Henderson said in his column today (yes it is online at 4 AM), the tunnel costs have doubled, so far! "If they were cautioning us last year that a tunnel could cost as much as $2 billion, how did it almost double?"

And the costs above are just for a 6 km stretch and do NOT include the costs to build to the border, the plaza and the new bridge. So add at least $500M or more on to that.

Here it is though, what makes this classic. Not only do you need underestimating of costs but you need unquantifiable overestimating of benefits:

• "1) The negative economic impacts are expected to be almost entirely locally oriented, affecting businesses within the ACA and some within close proximity.
  
  2) The positive economic impacts that the proposed access road and new international crossing will have in Southern Ontario and the greater Windsor region, including the city of Windsor and the towns of LaSalle and Tecumseh will be substantial.
  
  International exports account for $225 billion in provincial GDP, this represents over 40% of Ontario’s GDP. It is estimated that the Windsor-Essex County area accounts for over 3%, $7.5 billion, of Ontario’s international export GDP. Given the economic scale, any improvement to the speed and efficiency of goods and services crossing the border will have a tremendous impact on the economies of both Ontario and the Windsor-Essex County area. In addition, there is expected to be greater opportunity for industrial and large-scale commercial development along Highway 401 within the Windsor-Essex County area. The region will become more attractive for tourists from the United States to travel into the Windsor area and the reduction of traffic along local streets will, in many cases, assist local businesses. "

Oh please.....I cannot deal with this any longer. I do not have the stomach to hear this foolishness any more. Perhaps someone could give the DRIC consultants a copy of the Danish professor's book for them to read.

Dalton, Donna, Dwight and Sandra don't have the guts to do it. Stephen Harper and Lawrence Cannon don't have the guts to do it. Hopefully, the Chamber of sober, second thought--our Senate-- will have the common-sense to kill Bill C-3, the lynch-pin of this DRIC madness. Then the elected politicians can back off gracefully so that the real solution can be accomplished.

We need to do the right thing at a cost that makes sense and without disrupting communities using the public-private partnership that has worked well for almost 80 years in Windsor and Detroit! The Ambassador Bridge enhancement project can be finished in 30 months after Government approvals. It is time now to get it done.

This fiasco has now positively demonstrated that there is no other alternative that makes any sense! There, I have the guts to say it. I wish I had the power to do it.