A request for Assistance from the Province of Ontario

I wrote a letter to the Mon. Jim Watson, MPP (Ottawa West - Nepean), Minister of Municipal Affairs asking for assistance addressing potential conflicts of priorities regarding the building of new roads needed to service an ever growing Ottawa Hospital complex at the General Campus site. This is contrary to "smart growth" and the city of Ottawa's "Vision 2020" planning principles that encourage use of public transit, alking and cycling options instead of drivivng.

The need for this new road has been the subject of challenges by citizens groups for a number of years. however City Council elected to proceed with the project and it is currently in the design phase. A local councillor (Peter Hume) claims that the road is needed because of expected growth of the Ottawa Health Sciences Centre that is expected over coming years. It is unclear to me, and many others in the community, what the urgency is to complete this "hospital link" given that no development of ajacent hospital lands can take place for several years and that planned changes to transit in the area might well resolve existing problems anyway.

Further, the Province of Ontario's plan to expand health care services at one site that is far away from where constituents live and increasingly work is questionalble at best. The cost of the hospital link is estimated at $65 million (more likely $100 million). This money could go a long way to building urgent care and other small hospital facilities in suburban areas where they are most needed. This would reduce the transit strain on the hospital lands and likely extend their development shelf life into the next century.

It is clear that different Provincial government departments do not consult closely together when making expansion plans. Unfortunately, the city appears to accept Provincial planning decisions without practicing due diligence. This results in bad planning decisions on the city's part: building roads that might not be needed and reducing the effectiveness of its public transit systems for the long term.

Investigation of this issue also requires consultation with other Provincial government ministries including Health & Long Term Care as well as Infrastructure.