2 transit garages need work, but city can only afford to upgrade 1

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This article was published 06/04/2015 (4156 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

An administrative report suggests city hall can afford to replace or upgrade only one of two aged transit garages and a decision has to be made soon.

The Transit department has put a preliminary price tag of about $30 million to either replace or refurbish the 80-year-old north garage at 1520 Main Street, or expand the 45-year-old Fort Rouge Garage complex in south Osborne.

The report says both facilities are too small:

• the north garage on Main Street, for light bus maintenance, is 100,000 square feet and can accommodate 135 buses;
• the Fort Rouge garage, where 95 per cent of Transit’s heavy maintenance is done, consists of 480,000 square feet in two facilities, housing the primary administrative offices, and parking for 420 buses.

Transit is becoming a big spending department at city hall. In addition to the $590 price tag for the Southwest Transitway and the Jubilee Underpass projects, Transit opened in 2014 a $22.5 million bus garage on Brandon Avenue, adjacent to the Fort Rouge garage.

Transit has already approved spending an additional $26.65 million from 2016 to the end of 2020 at the Fort Rouge garage for continuation of ventilation system upgrade and roof replacement works, concrete floor repair and other necessary building upgrades.

The administrative report, to Thursday’s finance committee meeting, describes the north garage as “antiquated and in poor condition,” A conceptual design report will determine the suitability of the existing location and the potential cost of a replacement facility at the same location or elsewhere in the area.

A 2009 study of the Fort Rouge garage found that it had a shortage of 20,000 square feet of work and storage space and 11 vehicle maintenance bays, and the situation has only worsened in the intervening years. “An expansion and update of this facility is critical to support Transit operations in the near future,” the report states.

The transit report says it should have enough data to determine which garage should be expanded, and which one shuttered, by the end of the year.

 

aldo.santin@freepress.mb.ca