Airport tunnel needed
By Grant D. Galpin, For The Calgary Herald
Many people have wondered what all the fuss is about the Airport Trail tunnel and the deadline deal that passed last week without funding from federal and provincial governments. In fact, the Airport Trail is a visionary piece of infrastructure that has tremendous implications for a prosperous southern Alberta region.
First, it is infrastructure that would provide instant capacity for a very quick and inexpensive BRT-LRT link to the airport. The LRT option is now unavailable for over 25 years, until the north-central LRT line is built. Every person in the region would benefit from an LRT connection to the airport. The 18,000-plus airport terminal workforce could go to work without their cars. Many business people who do day flights to various other locations could leave their cars at home. Deerfoot Trail, Country Hills Boulevard, and McKnight Boulevard. would have thousands fewer vehicles on them every day.
Second, the airport tunnel would provide business and tourism access that saves millions of dollars for multiple industries. The Calgary Hotel Association provided a conservative estimate of $2 million per year of extra costs for just the 20 hotels in northeast Calgary, not including lost revenue from traffic routed to Deerfoot Trail if the tunnel is not built. Each hotel shuttle will expend $700 more in diesel fuel alone per month without the tunnel starting next March.
Third, all who travel by automobile in Calgary region will be affected by the traffic gridlock on Deerfoot Trail, Country Hills Boulevard and McKnight Boulevard. The traffic gridlock issue is not just a northeast issue. With primary access to the airport now being off of Deerfoot Trail, all of the former traffic that travelled along Barlow Trail north of McKnight Boulevard will be routed to Deerfoot Trail. With the tunnel, Calgary becomes a much greener city, with less auto-caused greenhouse gas emissions and greater LRT capacity.
Our mayor and city administration, by not prioritizing this critical infrastructure much earlier in the process, have shown a terrible lack of vision. The provincial government says, "it's not our problem" and does not care to address the huge economic loss that having a single access into the airport will have on provincial business, tourism, and international trade in southern Alberta.
The federal government, despite having jurisdiction over the land on which Calgary's airport sits, is unwilling to hold the Calgary Airport Authority accountable. The federal government would rather sit on the sidelines than take progressive action that would save millions of dollars for the future -- and make this the most industry-friendly and accessible airport in the country.
Finally, the Calgary Airport Authority (CAA) has shown the least courtesy to the very taxpayers who are footing the bill on its Taj Mahal plans. The $3-billion expansion is paid for by airport improvement fees collected for many years. It is paid for by parking fees, business fees, and user fees, all passed on to the taxpayer. If the CAA has its way, it will be paid for by the Canadian government providing more than 50 years of free rent -- a loss of over $800 million to the treasury.
The CAA only seems to care to get its runway built. It does not seem to care that the $10/hour worker in its terminal will have an additional $150 per month on his fuel bill that he cannot pay, and has no hope of taking public transit to his job for the next 25 years. The CAA does not care that the average taxi driver will now earn less because he is stuck in traffic and is able to pick up fewer passengers per day. It does not care that the average hotel owner will wrestle with lost business and $100,000 per year of greater costs.
And it does not care that the taxpayer who has paid for the runway will now pay substantially more to access the airport.
This is a colossal failure of leadership -- and only the ordinary citizens seem able to see the end of where the closure of Barlow Trail and the loss of the Airport Trail tunnel will lead. The CAA and our political leaders do not.
There was a time when Calgary and Alberta were considered visionary in how we welcomed the world, but today -- welcome to Calgary -- and enjoy your stay on Deerfoot Trail.
