Promised “at the start of the year” during the election campaign, the studies on the third Quebec-Lévis link must land by the end of March on the office of the Prime Minister.
The tunnel project to link Quebec and Lévis is still based on a presentation of about ten pages made public in April 2022 by the CAQ government. Many had mocked at the time an unprecedented unit of measurement brought into the world as part of the “bitube” project – the number of bridges per million inhabitants – which was to fill the argument of the Coalition avenir Québec (CAQ) in favor of the third link.
Since then, no new study has confirmed the suitability or feasibility of the tunnel. Hounded last fall on this subject, François Legault had repeated that it was impossible for him to present any earlier since the analyzes he had at his disposal did not take into account the growing use of telework. The comprehensive and updated studies were due to arrive in early 2023.
The wait is coming to an end, the head of government said on Thursday: he will have the studies in hand before April.
“What happened is that over the past few weeks, the people responsible for the analysis, we asked them if they had taken into account the impact of teleworking”, said François Legault Thursday, on the sidelines of his ceremonial appointment as honorary mayor of the City of Quebec. “The answer wasn’t clear, so we asked them to investigate that point. They told us that they will give it back to us. »
The Prime Minister says he is aware that the advent of telework, accelerated by the pandemic, has changed the travel habits of the population, in Quebec as elsewhere. “We know that there is a drop in traffic,” confirmed the Premier.
Many are waiting for these studies with a firm footing. Many fear that the tunnel will increase urban sprawl in Lévis and pollution in Québec. Some deplore a third link, which is mainly devoted to the automobile at a time when climate change is imposing, on the contrary, that we reduce its use.
The estimated bill for the construction site also puts off a large number of them: seven billion dollars, and this, before the inflationary outbreak observed for 12 months. A considerable sum, which would be invested to improve mobility in an area where congestion problems do not appear obvious to many.
The mayor of Quebec, Bruno Marchand, never gave his support to the third link, repeating to wait for the data from the government before taking a position. Thursday, at the end of a one-hour meeting with the Prime Minister, Mr. Marchand stressed that he had “very little discussed” the twin-tube project with the head of the CAQ.
Good understanding and tram
The current seemed to be restored between the two men, after the particularly stormy episode of last year, which had seemed to short-circuit the good understanding between the government of Quebec and its capital.
Several tenors of the Legault government then orchestrated an outing in good standing against Bruno Marchand and a shared 500-meter lane planned for the tram route. The mayor of Quebec was publicly out of his hinges, accusing the CAQ of playing “short-sighted politics” by courting motorists to attract the vote of the suburbs.
Eleven months after this period of turbulence, harmony reigns again. “There was a standoff, it was settled. For 12 months, we have been elsewhere, indicated Bruno Marchand in a press scrum. It couldn’t be better. »
In the meantime, responsibility for the Capitale-Nationale region has changed hands with the government. Geneviève Guilbault passed the torch to Jonatan Julien, a declared ally of the tram, which contrasts with the ambivalence maintained by the former Minister of Public Security in the file.
The mayor of Quebec even showed a certain lyricism in the face of such close harmony between the interests of the city and the ambitions of the prime minister. “I felt it every minute of [notre] meeting: the Prime Minister has the will to build Quebec. It’s not the first time I feel it, but I felt it again. It was renewed. »
The tram site should normally get under way this summer, a schedule that seems uncertain today, however. The City has not yet signed any contract related to the manufacture of the trains and the design of the infrastructures. The final cost of the project, estimated at almost four billion dollars in its last update, looks set to jump, inflated by inflation over the past year.
According to the current agreement, the Quebec government will pay 50% of the bill.
“It remains reasonable, given the size of the population,” said François Legault Thursday, before uttering six words that may be enough to reap the good graces of the mayor: “We are always in favor of the project. »