P.E.I. senator keeps up fight against bridge tolls

P.E.I. Senator Percy Downe says the federal government isn’t being straightforward with Islanders when it comes to tolls on the Confederation Bridge. Downe issued a press release this week, keeping up his argument that it doesn’t make sense that government won’t be charging tolls on the new Champlain Bridge in Montreal but continue to do so on Confederation Bridge.

He pointed to comments federal Infrastructure and Communities Minister Amarjeet Sohi made in the Senate recently.

“Related to the new toll-free Champlain Bridge in Montreal, the bridge that we are building is a replacement. It is not a new bridge,” Sohi said. “The bridge that already exists needs to be replaced. The reason we are committed to not having a toll on the new Champlain Bridge is that the current one does not have a toll.”

Downe says that’s not true. “In reality, the current Champlain Bridge charged a toll for most of its existence. The toll was only abolished on May 4, 1990,” Downe said.

“The idea that there can’t be a toll on the new Champlain Bridge because it is a replacement also applies to Confederation Bridge, replacing as it did a ferry service, which in turn replaced the ice boats that came before it.”

Downe also notes that when P.E.I. joined Confederation in 1873, the terms of union required that the federal government be responsible for assuming and defraying the costs of “continuous communication.”

He said it was a good sign when Prime Minister Justin Trudeau acknowledged at a town hall meeting last year that Confederation Bridge “was an expensive bridge to build and it’s an expensive bridge to cross.” “This acknowledgement by Prime Minister Trudeau is the first recognition by the Government of Canada of the high cost Islanders pay for transportation,” Downe says.

The P.E.I. senator says another good sign was that Trudeau said he would pass on the concerns of the toll cost to the Island’s MPs.

“We will look at what can be done to make sure that people are able to travel freely, travel efficiently and openly across this country at modest costs,” the prime minister said.

Downe said the toll for cars, $46.50, is the most expensive toll for a bridge in Canada.

“Islanders wait to hear the results of the prime minister’s meetings with Island MPs so we can travel, in the prime minister’s own words, at modest costs,” the senator said.