Winnipeg Free Press - PRINT EDITION
New expressway seen as a road to riches
$212-M project helps link CentrePort to the world
KEN GIGLIOTTI / WINNIPEG FREE PRESS Diane Grey: more than an industrial park
It's only asphalt, but leaders from three levels of government say a new expressway near Winnipeg's international airport will be the road to riches for Manitoba.
Premier Greg Selinger, Mayor Sam Katz and Public Safety Minister Vic Toews met inside the observation lounge at Richardson International Airport Friday to announce the start of construction for CentrePort Canada Way, a $212-million expressway in the northwest corner of the city.
"CentrePort ...has the ability to do what nothing else can accomplish for our city (for) economic impact and creating phenomenal jobs," Katz said to a roomful of CentrePort directors and business leaders. "This is the beginning of something very wonderful and very special."
CentrePort Canada Way is a four-lane expressway, about 10-kilometres long, that will run through the 20,000 acres of CentrePort, the country's first inland port adjacent to the airport lands. It will connect the west Perimeter to Brookside Boulevard and include two new overpasses and an interchange, all to be built over several years.
Global construction and engineering firm SNC Lavalin says it has secured a $142-million contract to design and construct the expressway. It said Friday the project is underway on the four-kilometre stretch which it expects to complete in 2012, with the expressway opening in 2014.
In addition to the new expressway, the government leaders announced another $73.9 million will be spent upgrading: the Trans-Canada Highway east of Winnipeg, from Deacon's Corner to PTH 12; Highway 75 between Ste. Agathe and Morris; and PTH 12, east of Winnipeg with a bridge replacement and intersection improvements between the Red River Floodway to PR 207.
Selinger said the road projects will link CentrePort with the Port of Churchill and Hudson's Bay, continental United States and Mexico and Canada's east and west coasts.
Diane Gray, CEO of CentrePort, said the inland port is more than a giant industrial park, adding it has the potential to provide manufacturers and distributors with links to suppliers and markets around the world.
Toews said that once complete, CentrePort will increase Canada's opportunities on the world stage.
"CentrePort Canada is definitely a key component of Canada's economic prosperity as we emerge from the recession," Toews said.
-- With files from Canadian Press
Republished from the Winnipeg Free Press print edition June 19, 2010 B10
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