EPC fails to decide parkway fate

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This article was published 08/11/2017 (3125 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

South Charleswood residents will have to live with another month of uncertainty after the city’s executive policy committee voted on Wednesday to delay a decision on extending Sterling Lyon Parkway.

The EPC voted to lay over a motion to kill the controversial plan for an east-west corridor that would expropriate 96 properties.

The motion won’t be discussed by EPC until Nov. 29, and council would vote on it Dec. 13.

“That gives us another month where we don’t know the value of our properties,” said Lori Dobbie, a member of the South Wilkes Community Association that opposes the extension.

She was encouraged that councillors on the committee spoke against the plan.

“Finally, the area is getting its point across,” Dobbie said. She was part of a large delegation of south Charleswood residents who attended the EPC meeting.

Coun. Scott Gillingham put forward the layover, saying there is a lack of clarity around the twinning of Wilkes Avenue, with public works figures ranging from roughly $30 million to $160 million.

“It’s important information we don’t have,” he said.

Mayor Brian Bowman, who supported delaying the decision, said EPC members need to review a lot of documentation.

“There’s a lot of information — a lot of misinformation — that’s been out in the public realm,” he said after the meeting.

Councillors condemned the public works department for the way the file was handled.

“As an X-Files fan, I know the truth is out there and I’m going to make it my mission to find out what happened.”–Charleswood-Tuxedo Coun. Marty Morantz 

Earlier in the meeting, real-estate expert Brett Ferguson told the committee he was paid by consultant WSP Canada in the fall of 2015 to estimate the cost of expropriations for a plan to extend the parkway, referred to as Option 4.

This was several months before the public works department held public consultations on three other options, but not Option 4. Last month, the civic department presented Option 4 to residents as the preferred route.

“The only thing you can draw from that is the (public) consultations were essentially a sham,” Coun. Marty Morantz said.

Morantz, who represents the area, opposed the delay.

“We should be saying right here and now that Option 4 is completely off the table,” he said.

Ferguson said he updated his expropriation estimate for the South Wilkes group, and arrived at a figure of $21.4 million for Option 4.

Option 4 would affect homes along a number of streets, which would have to be partially or completely taken for the project and connected at an intersection with the extended William R. Clement Parkway.

The preferred option of the South Wilkes Community Association is the twinning of Wilkes Avenue.

City chief administrator Doug McNeil said he does not yet know how a civic department moved ahead with the plan without first informing him or council. He added that the option of twinning Wilkes Avenue needs to be studied more.

Morantz vowed to find out how Option 4 proceeded as far as it did without council input.

“As an X-Files fan, I know the truth is out there, and I’m going to make it my mission to find out what happened,” Morantz said.

bill.redekop@freepress.mb.ca