Imagine a government planning the most expensive infrastructure project of its generation.
He promises to build it, no matter the cost, no matter how useful, no matter what the environmental impact.
Foolish, isn’t it?
Yet this is what the Caquista government is doing with the third link between Quebec and Lévis.
Even if the bill were to double, he will.
Even though experts assess that traffic congestion will not decrease in the long run, it will.
Even though environmental studies are critical, so will it.
I go back in history, I look for similar cases, and I do not find any.
François Legault launched the promise during the last electoral campaign. The cost was then estimated at 4 billion. The new estimate, including related costs, amounts to 9.7 billion. And the bill should go up, because the study of the opportunity has not even been filed yet.
It’s huge.
By way of comparison, the Romaine hydroelectric complex will cost $ 7.2 billion, and its plants will supply the equivalent of 470,000 homes. Another example: the plan to green the economy of all of Quebec provides for a budget of $ 6.7 billion over five years.
On its own, the third link will cost more. Of how many ? The CAQ does not know, and it does not concern it. It does not impose any cap!
Yet dollars are meticulously counted for greener projects such as the Quebec City tramway and the Montreal metro extension.
All this for what ? We don’t know …
According to Quebec, the third link could reduce travel time by a modest 15% for its 55,000 users. This study remains confidential. If it were reliable, the government would not hesitate to reveal it …
Experts are skeptical. All the experts, in fact. None supported the project.
I repeat: what could become the biggest project in contemporary Quebec is not supported by any expert in urbanism or transport planning.
Barely 2.3% of residents of the Capitale-Nationale spend more than an hour a day in their car. For 20 years, traffic has increased very little on the Pierre-Laporte Bridge (1.1%) and the Quebec Bridge. And the active population on the South Shore will decline by 2040.
It is not a question of repairing an existing section, as in the case of the old Champlain Bridge. We add to the road capacity. However, the agglomeration of Quebec is among those with the most highway kilometers per capita in the country, and the least public transport.
This is what justifies according to François Legault to dig this mastodon with two floors under the river, of which four of the six tracks will be for cars. It will require the largest tunnel boring machine in the world. This is all to reduce congestion temporarily, before it returns to normal in the long term due to “induced traffic”.
READ an interview on induced traffic (Université Laval)
And the environment?
The minister responsible for it, Benoit Charette, explained at the start of his mandate that he did not need studies to conclude that the project would be “green”.
His argument: the vehicles will be electric. This is not serious. First, gasoline vehicles will continue to be sold until 2034 and some will continue to operate after 2040.
Then, even if all models were to become electric tomorrow, there would still be a problem of urban sprawl, loss of agricultural areas and destruction of wetlands, destruction that the CAQ has also facilitated by weakening regulations.
It helps to understand the Ottawa process.
The federal Minister of the Environment, Steven Guilbeault, wants to carry out his own study.
The new law on evaluations, in force since 2019, gives it this power. Ottawa used it for a highway project in Ontario, and it wants to do it for the third link as well.
In the eyes of François Legault, it would be an attack on the Nation. Yet the federal study would cast a wider net. It would assess the impact of the road on the climate and on the ecosystems of the region. The Quebec Environmental Law Center therefore requested it.
I know, the centralizing government of Justin Trudeau often interferes without embarrassment in the jurisdictions of Quebec. But in this case, it’s different.
The environment is a shared competence. In addition, he is asked to sign a check for approximately $ 4 billion. And this, by drawing from an envelope intended for green infrastructures. This means that the money going to the third link would reduce the money available for public transport elsewhere in the country.
At COP26, Mr. Legault invites us not to be “eco-anxiety”. Let us be “proud”, he says, praising the Quebec record, the best in North America. According to him, Quebec is doing “its part”.
Whether we agree or not with Mr. Legault, that does not change the problem: the climate crisis is already causing costs because of the erosion of the banks, the foundations of the houses which are cracking, the submerged roads, the floods, melting permafrost or even heat waves that overwhelm vulnerable people. The annual bill could exceed $ 1 billion per year.
READ the report of the Climate Change Project Office DISCOVER the report of the Union of Quebec Municipalities SEE the report of the Canadian Institute for Climate Choices
Even if Quebec did not want to do anything more against global warming, from a strictly selfish point of view, it would pay off to invest in prevention to minimize this damage.
As for congestion in the Capitale-Nationale, less expensive solutions undoubtedly exist to relieve road congestion and improve public transport.
The money swallowed up in this pharaonic project would be better used for something else such as renovating schools, building seniors’ residences or mitigating the effects of global warming.
The great flaw in the third link is there: in the opportunity cost.
I cannot believe this government of accountants is ignoring it.