Morantz calls for reset on east-west corridor

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This article was published 07/11/2017 (2903 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

City hall has no plans to build a proposed east-west corridor in South Charleswood any time soon.

Coun. Marty Morantz, chairman of the public works committee overseeing the project, said he doesn’t understand why city engineering staff and a consulting firm presented the corridor as a pending project, explaining that it is a low priority with no chance of being built in the near future.

“Currently there is no money in the budget to build this project and given that other projects have a higher priority it will likely be many years or even a decade before any construction occurs,” said Morantz, who is also the area councillor. “No timelines for construction (of an east-west corridor) have been established.”

Morantz is the first city official to contradict information provided to area residents, who said they had been told by city staff and the consultant that the project’s priority had been raised and construction on the Sterling Lyon Parkway extension would likely begin by 2021.

City hall had engaged engineering consulting firm MMM Group (now known as WSP Canada) in December 2014 to help city staff develop options for the southward expansion of the William R. Clement Parkway and to study a possible east-west corridor linking the Clement Parkway to Kenaston Boulevard, part of the city’s long-term plan to complete the inner-ring road network.

After the city and MMM had presented three route options to area residents in January 2016, the MMM team, apparently on their own initiative, developed the controversial fourth option — the southwest extension of the Sterling Lyon Parkway — and submitted it to the province in July 2017 as the city’s preferred choice. Residents learned of the new route only in early October, prompting an intense lobbying effort which led to last week’s public works meeting which voted to limit any future east-west route to a twinning of Wilkes.

Morantz said he remains disappointed with how city staff in charge of the project, along with the consulting team, had misled residents and developed the parkway extension route without authorization from council or informing the public works committee.

Morantz said he is concerned no explanations will be found and no one held accountable once the city’s lead engineer on the project — Scott Suderman, who tendered his resignation last week — leaves city hall.

“This was a situation where due process was simply not followed,” Morantz said. “There’s lots of questions around it.”

Morantz said it appears the only detailed engineering work that had been completed was on the Sterling Lyon Parkway extension, adding no credible engineering work was done to determine costs estimates to twin Wilkes Avenue.

Morantz said once council clearly states its opposition to the Sterling Lyon Parkway extension, a new project team will properly study the Wilkes route.

“The engineers can go back and show us different options for the alignment around Wilkes, then we can get that cost-engineered,” Morantz said. “Wilkes can be twinned. It would be a perfect east-west corridor.”

Morantz said he was disappointed to learn that Suderman had tendered his resignation last week but Morantz said he still believes that Suderman needed to be replaced on the project, adding he also hopes that the consulting firm WSP Canada will be let go as well.

“There are so many questions around this project it’s time for a reset, a complete reset of the team engineering this project,” Morantz said.

Morantz said he’s not concerned that Suderman’s departure somehow has created a morale problem within the public works department, or even across the public service.

“I said at (last week’s public work’s committee) meeting I lost trust in the public service. I’ve lost trust with this process, frankly,” Morantz said. “If it means that at the end of the day we need to have new people come in, with a different perspective, people we can work with.”

Morantz said WSP Canada cannot be allowed to remain on the project.

The firm’s actions, he said, “ought to preclude them on this project from proceeding. I made that very clear to the CAO (Doug McNeil). We’ll see what he does with it.”

aldo.santin@freepress.mb.ca