SUBWAY COST ‘SANITIZED’
NDP not keen on sharing details on why Cost of Skytrain extension has soared
At first glance the report on the Broadway SkyTrain extension posted on the transportation ministry website holds out the hope of shedding light on how construction costs have soared to half a billion dollars per kilometre.
“Cost report,” it says, followed by a comprehensive statement of purpose: “This document details the preliminary cost estimate of the reference concept design for the Millennium Line Broadway extension project.”
But the first indication that the contents offered less than full disclosure came when I clicked on the link and learned that the copy released for public consumption had been “redacted” and, yes, “sanitized.”
I’ll say it was.
Doubtless the unsanitized and unredacted version of the 13-page report from March of this year contained a full breakdown of the cost of extending the existing SkyTrain line from the Clark Drive campus of Vancouver Community College westward along Broadway to Arbutus.
“The estimate assumes that all the work is carried out as one single project and covers costs including project management, preliminary design and technical investigations, engagement and consultation, procurement, design, construction, risk, contingencies and interest during construction,” according to the text.
The methodology was thorough. The costs include money spent to date on planning the project, through the 18 months or so it will take to put the expansion out to tender and award the contract, and then the years of construction up to a targeted in-service date of 2025.
Finally the report from the provincial Partnerships B.C. agency insists that all the numbers have been checked and double-checked: “A due diligence review of the capital cost estimate was conducted, which confirmed that the budget currently carried is reasonable to design, construct and commissioning of the approximately 5.7 (kilometre) extension to the existing Millennium Line SkyTrain network.”
In short, the New Democrats commissioned the detailed budget for the project, vetted the numbers, and know what each component is expected to cost. They just aren’t telling the taxpaying public anything about it.
For when you get the dollar breakdowns on page 9 of the report, every last detail is blanked out in the name of confidentiality and protecting the public interest.
For instance, five of the 5.7 kilometres will consist of twin, bored tunnels, hence the name Broadway Subway. The estimated cost of doing this is withheld.
The terms call for the construction of underground stations at Great Northern Way, Main, Cambie, Oak, Granville and Arbutus. Each of the six is costed as a separate entry. Each is also blanked out in the copy for public consumption.
Property purchases are one of the main cost drivers in building public infrastructure these days, though it’s not clear how much that would be a factor with the routing more than 85 per cent underground.
The City of Vancouver has donated an estimated $100 million worth of land as its contribution. The rest is a guess, because the estimated cost of property purchases is also censored from the report.
So on through the withheld cost estimates for “roadwork, site preparation, utility relocation, landscaping, environmental mitigation, track work, train control and signalling, security, power, fare collection, engineering, public consultations and contingencies.” All suppressed.
Instead the government chose to release only the total cost estimate for the project: $2,826,458,192. Which strikes me as a fancifully precise amount for what is said to be “a preliminary cost estimate,” based on a “reference concept design,” without benefit of a tender call or multiple bids, never mind a finalized contract.
But for what it is worth, that translates to an estimated cost of $495,869,858 per kilometre.
I was directed to this report by a government representative when I asked why the latest SkyTrain extension was costing almost four times as much per kilometre as the Evergreen line, completed less than two years ago for $130 million per kilometre.
The report doesn’t answer the question, nor much of anything else. Perhaps more detailed breakdowns will be released after the contract is awarded.
For now, one is left to guess about the main cost drivers or where the project is most likely to go over budget. (Shocking as I know it would be, for a public infrastructure project to end up costing more than the preliminary estimate.)
The same is true for the costing on the new Surrey-Newton-Guildford light rail line, budgeted at 20 per cent more per kilometre ($157 million versus $130 million) than the Evergreen line, though surface light rail entails neither tunnelling nor SkyTrain guideways.
On that project, even the aggregated estimate of $1.65 billion, released yesterday, is blanked from the report containing the preliminary capital cost estimate.
The province and TransLink did provide an explanation of sorts Wednesday for why the federal government will be covering only 31 per cent of the capital cost for the Vancouver and Surrey transit projects.
Turns out that Ottawa only puts itself on the hook for “eligible” costs on capital projects, a handy escape hatch that excludes property acquisition and a number of other substantial cost drivers.
The result can be seen in this week’s release on the respective capital contributions of senior governments to the two projects.
Though the New Democrats claimed to be matching federal contributions when they agreed to put up 40 per cent of the capital cost, the province will in fact be paying $1.82 billion to Ottawa’s $1.37 billion, a not inconsiderable difference of $450 million.
On page 9 of the report, every last detail is blanked out in the name of confidentiality and protecting the public interest.