City accused of stalling on Cavendish extension

The city is dragging its feet on plans to extend Cavendish Blvd. from St-Laurent to Côte-St-Luc, the municipal opposition charged Monday.

“We’ve talked about it for donkey’s years,” said Alan DeSousa, StLaurent borough mayor and vicepresident of Montreal’s finance and administration committee.

“We had made really good headway in the last four years.”

“What’s surprising is that in this budget, there’s no money scheduled for 2018 and there’s very little for 2019 and 2020,” he said.

DeSousa made the remarks after the committee, which includes elected officials from Montreal as well as independent municipalities on the island, approved the city’s $6.38-billion, three-year capitalworks program, despite dissent from opposition councillors and suburban mayors.

Outlining how much the city plans to spend on projects like roadwork, water mains, sewers and parks, the capital works budget will be presented to Montreal city council for approval Tuesday.

The three-year spending plan budgets $13 million over the next three years for the Cavendish extension, whose total price tag is estimated at $355 million.

“The bulk of the more than $350 million has been punted into the future, who knows when,” DeSousa said.

Last year, the stars finally seemed aligned in favour of the Cavendish extension, a project that has been talked about since the 1950s.

In June, Montreal and the Quebec government reached a deal to build the road link and develop the former Blue Bonnets site on the west side of Décarie Blvd. at Jean-Talon St.

Côte- St-Luc, which had opposed the extension for years, now backs it. And Mayor Valérie Plante — then leader of the municipal opposition — said in October she also favoured the extension even though her party had been against it in the past.

“My concern is that after all that effort of maintaining the momentum, that if we’ve essentially taken our foot off the gas, it will likely again get delayed,” DeSousa said. “We’re asking the administration to put it back on the front burner.”

During the committee hearing, N.D.G. city councillor Peter McQueen said before starting work on Cavendish, the city must negotiate a deal with Canadian National and Canadian Pacific Railways.

Youssef Amane, a spokesperson for Plante, said the city wants the Cavendish link to provide access to the future Blue Bonnets project but not be used as a bypass for Highways 40 and 15. The future road will be designed for all kinds of transportation, including public transit, cyclists and pedestrians, he said.

He also said that the amount set aside for the Cavendish project also includes $110 million for negotiations with the two railways.