Surrey Must Pay Back $70 Million To TransLink!
Surrey must pay back the $70 million already spent on LRT, if not, TransLink and the region must halt all transit planning in Surrey!
The Light Rail project was ten years in the making, with much work and money spent during this time, $70 million dollars and just on the eve of letting contracts, an old man is elected as mayor and claims, without any documentation or any credible plan, that he can build SkyTrain for the same cost as light rail, withdraws Surrey’s support for light rail.
After spending $50,000,000 in engineering and planning and another $20,000,000 in pre-construction costs for the LRT, and the end result being nothing, TransLink and the region should be refunded the $70 million spent, before another penny is spent in Surrey.
Businesses which located in Fleetwood, on the basis of light rail being build, should also consider their options, as well and investigate suing the City of Surrey for “Breech of Promise”.
And, if SkyTrain cannot be built for the same cost of light rail, then legal action by TransLink and Metro Vancouver should take legal against the Mayor of Surrey and the Councillors involved.
I just love to see the SkyTrain for Surrey folks in court for the defense!
What is really sad, is that once again Surrey and Vancouver, demonstrate the incestuous nature of transit planning in the region. Again the world sees us as a bunch of uneducated “hicks” from the sticks.
One clarification Zwei, the $20,000,000 for pre-construction costs was spent by mostly Surrey and a smaller part of it was by Translink. So the City of Surrey itself, essentially wasted almost $20,000,000 of its own money as well as owing Translink. The problem is those idiots at Translink have so far given Surrey’s Council a free pass on wasting large amounts of cash and getting nothing for it. As long Translink says nothing the cash is out the window, and no one is being held responsible.
Will this have repercussions for Vancouver…
The same gullibility of the public and unforeseen consequences seems to exist in that city.
Calm down.
Translink wasted $50 million because they did not listen to the people. No one wanted LRT. If they listened to the public, they would have known the LRT was unwanted.
Zwei replies: I rescued your comment from the spam dump, which means WordPress has your email registered as spam.
LRT in Surrey was 10 years in the making, ten years in the public domain and it wan’r until the SkyTrain for Surrey folk, started their political campaign of misinformation and deceit, did the LRT become a political football.
This is not to say, Translink handled the issue poorly, but they had no choice, to defend light rail, they would have to tell the truth about SkyTrain and that woul be suicide for the Broadway subway and for SkyTrain.