Peace and Environment News* December 1992-January 1993
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Peace and Environment News * December 1992-January 1993 |
by Lucy Segatti
The Ontario government is in the process of spending $350 million on the construction of Highway 416 near Ottawa—a tidy sum in itself, but if one adds in the environmental, social and other economic costs of the project, this new highway becomes even less of a bargain.
The construction of Highway 416 reflects the 1950s planning mentality that gave us urban sprawl. Given the ecological and economic crises we face in the 1990s, this approach to transportation is simply inappropriate. If completed, Highway 416 will perpetuate dependence on private vehicles—both private cars and transport trucks.
By adding the cost of "externalities" to direct costs, Pollution Probe calculated, in a recent publication entitled The Costs of the Car, that in Ontario alone, private cars are subsidized by $5 billion every year. Hidden costs include damage to agriculture, tourism, and forestry from acidification, crop damage due to ground-level ozone, lost time as a result of traffic congestion, and lost productivity due to vehicle-related injuries and death.
The Ontario government approved the construction of Highway 416 in response to persistent lobbying by industry and business groups. The main purpose of the new highway will be to provide an alternative route for transport trucks.
Destructive effects
Building highways and subsidizing private vehicles in the 1990s will have the same outcome as the subsidization of nuclear power plants over the last twenty years. Completing the construction of Highway 416 will mean throwing good money after bad, only to find in the end that new roads are an ecologically destructive and economically unsustainable solution to our transportation problems.
In the March 1992 issue of New Planning, the Commission on Planning and Development Reform in Ontario stated that by building new roads, the provincial government encourages people to live further away from their workplace, and is increasing its own costs by supporting the use of an extensive road network.
Reallocation to sustainable modes
The provincial subsidy allocated to Highway 416 would go a long way towards restoring sustainable transportation modes, such as rail for freight and intercity passenger transportation, and improving urban public transit service. Not only would rail service for freight make existing highways safer by discouraging the use of ever larger tractor trailers, but the shipping of dangerous chemicals, which is still being allowed, would at least be confined to a known corridor.
In addition, Highway 416 would destroy precious farmland and disrupt the wildlife habitat in the Stony Swamp Conservation Area. Construction of Highway 416 close to or through sensitive ecological areas and wildlife corridors will cause irreversible damage.
Finally, the Jobs-Ontario program is being touted as creating jobs for Ontarians while "providing...highways and preserving the environment." This statement betrays an irresponsible ignorance of the gravity of our ecological crisis. Roads are destructive and the jobs created by building roads are not long-term, do not generally benefit the local community, and are not ecologically sustainable.
Further review needed
As the work on Highway 416 is still in its initial stages, Auto-Free Ottawa is urging the Ontario government to halt construction, or at the very least, defer it until the review of provincial farmland and land-use policies has been completed.
Full-cost accounting should be applied to the construction of Highway 416, taking into account the health, ecological, and economic costs that Ontario citizens will have to pay over the long term if Highway 416 is completed. Sustainable alternatives to capital projects should be promoted as a means to create local jobs.
An environmental impact assessment was completed in 1987, "after a lengthy public hearing," according to Brian Ruck, Area Engineer for the province. Copies of the study are on file in public libraries throughout Ottawa under the title of "Highway 16 Corridor Study Environmental Assessment of Highway 416, Century Road to Highway 417."
In view of the concern expressed in rural communities south of Ottawa, and growing public awareness of the unprecedented deterioration of our planet, today an environmental assessment review and public consultation carried out in goodwill would probably not support paving over still more of our battered planet. As long as the bulldozers haven't destroyed farmland and natural areas, there may still be time to reverse this untimely project.
For more information on Auto-Free Ottawa, please call Lucy Segatti at 234-0923.
Lucy Segatti is a member of Auto-Free Ottawa.
Converted April 10, 2001 - Lg
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