The looming transportation infrastructure projects that will make life easier in Cochrane are still moving forward after the release of the UCP’s Budget 2020 on Thursday, Feb. 27.
“I was pleased that the provincial government kept that funding in there,” Cochrane Mayor Jeff Genung said Wednesday (Mar. 4) morning.
To further demonstrate the government's commitment to helping our community, Genung received a letter from Ric McIver, Minister of Transportation, earlier this week that accepted Cochrane’s request to have the extension of Highway 22 up to Sunset Blvd. included in the design and engineering of that intersection.
“Not only are they funding and committing to the project, they’re also committing to working with Cochrane to expand that project to include some of the needed infrastructure to allow two lanes to come out of Sunset Blvd. onto Highway 22 which is a real bottleneck in our community right now.”
Genung pointed to three priorities in the recent budget: supporting job creation, making life better for Albertans and standing up for Alberta.
“The first action item they highlighted was prioritizing infrastructure projects that will enable future private sector investment and this includes transportation bottlenecks and reducing congestion in key trading and industrial corridors,” Genung said.
“That to me is exactly what the 1A and 22 is for our region.” He added that another action item is maximizing investment in Alberta’s tech sector. Genung said the town has been actively identifying opportunities to cut red tape, streamline processes and promote business development.
“We just launched our business strategy at our last meeting and obviously our innovation centre is being designed to do exactly what the provicine is saying here, creating local jobs in the tech and innovation sector and creating new businesses to hopefully locate here in Cochrane.”
Pete Guthrie, MLA for Airdrie-Cochrane, echoed Genung’s enthusiasm and said no changes are expected to the anticipated construction on Highway 1A west of Cochrane, or the interchange at 1A and Highway 22.
“Those are still a go ahead,” Guthrie said on Friday (Feb. 28), a day after the budget release.
Guthrie said the recent budget doesn’t sway from proclamations made in the last budget, released October 24, 2019. The fall budget contains allocations for $597 million for highway twinning, widening and expansion. The 2019 provincial construction program identifies an interchange upgrade on Highway 1A on the northwest boundary of Cochrane and bridge replacement at the Big Hill Creek on Highway 1A at the northern boundary of Cochrane.
In November of last year a land agreement between the Stoney Nakoda First Nation and the province paved the way for the widening of sections of Highway 1A between Cochrane and Canmore. About 29 kilometres of the highway will be widened from the current width of 6.7 metres to 13 metres. The project will include the creation of shoulders and reduce the frequency of steep ditches, straighten curves and smooth dips.
“Budget 2020 continues our focus on creating jobs, growing our economy and streamlining programs and services to ensure a sustainable future,” said Travis Toews, President of Treasury Board and Minister of Finance in a press release.
“Our plan is working. We are on track to balance the budget by 2022-23 and Alberta’s surplus in that year is expected to be higher than that projected in Budget 2019. We are also maintaining funding for health and education while ensuring each dollar is wisely spent on what Albertans need most.”
Guthrie adds that the province’s deficit was $1.2 billion lower than what the UCP forecasted four months ago. He says reducing the deficit will save Albertan’s $35 million in debt-servicing costs and is partly due to selling off $10.6 billion worth of crude-by-rail contracts to the private sector. Premier Jason Kenney announced last month that the cost of divesting the contracts will come in $200 million lower than originally budgeted for.
The contracts were entered into by the previous Notley government just before the provincial election in an effort to ship more oil out of the province. The NDP signed a series of contracts for the lease of 4,400 rail cars plus associated rail services. The goal was to eventually ship an additional 120,000 barrels per day out of the province by train.
Guthrie said the UCP are in good shape to balance the budget in 2022-23 as planned. He said the UCP has maintained health and education funding, child services funding has increased, the community and social services budget was maintained and seniors and housing funding was maintained.
“We are on track. We feel that from a growth perspective we’re going to see GDP growth increase here over the next few years which I think is very good for Alberta. We’re seeing the effects.”
