Council defers decision on bypass route endorsement
Developers and planners in communities along the route of a proposed highway bypassing Saskatoon will have to wait a little longer to learn whether the city will endorse the province's proposed route.
City council's Wednesday meeting stretched well into the late evening, after a lengthy discussion of taxi cab licensing occupied the bulk of the daytime hours.
In total, the project is meant to encompass a 55-kilometre stretch of four-lane highway running east and north from Highway 11 south of the city and connecting with Highway 7 to the west. Phase 2 of the functional planning study addresses the bypass route between the river and Highway 11 south of the city limit.
Council heard from speakers opposed to the Phase 2 route on the grounds that it would harm the ecologically sensitive Northeast Swale and Small Swale areas.
Candace Savage, a representative from the Swale Watchers environmental group, noted the city has done extensive work to protect the swales in its own projects, pointing to the decision to impose lower speed limits on Mcormond Drive as an example.
“Please, do not rubber-stamp this flawed report,” Savage said during her remarks, noting some of the work underpinning the province's preferred route is now more than 20 years old.
City staff recommended council endorse the route, noting this would provide certainty to city planners trying to sort out where to put new neighbourhoods and roadways, as well as municipal staff and private landowners trying to make plans throughout the region.
Council had a chance to put questions to Highways Ministry representative Brent Miller. He noted that the functional planning study is still an early phase of the project, with no construction likely to begin for at least 15 years or more.
With such a lengthy timeline ahead, Miller said there is no sense in doing a full environmental impact assessment at this stage of the process, since all that work would have to be done again much closer to construction.
Miller said the ministry will seek to protect habitat and heritage resources along the route of the project, and suggested measures such as wildlife overpasses, noise-dampening road surfacing and sound barriers would likely be employed to mitigate potential harms.
However, Miller said he couldn't guarantee how the province might take recommendations from an eventual environmental impact assessment.
That led Ward 6 Coun. Cynthia Block to put forward a motion to defer council's decision on a route endorsement until the province can provide its “guiding principles” regarding environmental protection along the proposed bypass route.
“It is not my intention to stall, it is my sincere effort to gain clarity around the intent, not just the spirit of how the province will address mitigation efforts in the swale when the time comes,” she said.
Ward 3 Coun. David Kirton supported the deferral, while expressing concern over “the lack of information” provided to council, pointing out that councillors didn't get the full report before an initial request for an endorsement that had to be delayed in order to allow them to have the information.
He called the proposed alignment “a huge mistake” that would be at odds with council decisions to protect the swale in other projects, such as the boundaries set during discussion of building the University Heights neighbourhood.
Ward 5 Coun. Randy Donauer opposed the deferral, suggesting it could leave the province “shocked” after city staff and provincial planners had worked together for years on the project.
“I do not like the stall game, and the delay game. I just don't like it. I don't think it's honest and I don't think it's the way we negotiate with our partners,” he said, expressing concern the deferral could poison city-province relations on other big-ticket proposals.
Mayor Charlie Clark supported endorsing the Phase 2 route at the committee level. In comments before the vote, he noted the city has previously joined with other communities in the region to pressure the province to finish the planning.
However, Clark ended up voting in favour of the deferral, expressing regret at making “a political calculation” that deferring until the province can provide more information might be the only way to get enough councillors onside to eventually endorse the route.
With the deferral passed, council also approved a motion to have the province's response come directly to council, rather than committee.