Wednesday, March 26, 2008

Ontario gives $27M to Ottawa for transit

An article on CBC.ca today told of $27M alotted in the 2008 Ontario provincial budget to public transit project in the Ottawa area, and mayor Larry O'Brien is said to be pleased with that amount:

The 2008 provincial budget, released by Finance Minister Dwight Duncan Tuesday afternoon, included $8.2 million for social housing and $27 million for public transit in Ottawa, both previously announced.

[...]

O'Brien said the budget is "not the big bang that we had last year, but all in all I'm pretty satisfied with how they treated Ottawa."

I checked out the budget (which is available here) and all I could find was lip service to Queen's Park's "commitment" to public transit in Ottawa, on page 36, near the top:
"In addition, the Province remains committed to transit improvements in the City of Ottawa in cooperation with municipal and federal partners. The Province will review the recently released vision for public transit in Ottawa and assess next steps with the City and federal government. The government remains committed to investing $200 million in transit in Ottawa."
(page 36, "2008 Ontario Budget: Growing a Stronger Ontario")
Which, even if it is lip service, says that (hopefully) we Ottawans can count on the province when the city council finally decides on which direction we're going in terms of transit.

I've got queries out to the information line about where that $27M is promised, as well as some to councillors regarding where that money's going to go. I'll provide updates when they become available.

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