That would be the first positive from the BC liberals that I know of. There must be something she's not saying.

Now were talking. A three way cost split. Isn't is encouraging when we can all work together. Everyone can consider participating if they only have to kick in 1/3. Percy

Another empty lie from the Liberal party

Or I should say promise

The B.S. with this bridge continues. Lets look a some history.

1. The foothills bridge across the Nechako was part of a long term plan to bypass Prince George. Foothills was to connect with the Hart Hiway somewhere around Summit Lake and connect with 97 South somewhere around Stoner. This bypass would have meant a new bridge across the Fraser River. This projection was based on Prince George having a population of 200,000 people by the year 2000. None of this happened Foothills ends at the Chief Lake road North, and at the foot of University Hill to the South. As a result we have the Foothills bridge completlety under utilized.

2. The Provincial Government built a new bridge across the Nechako (John Hart Bridge) and when it was finished gave the Cameron St. Bridge to the City for $1.00 and the City agreed to look after the maintenance. Later the Provincial Government twinned the John Hart Bridge for a cost of $27 Million dollars plus a $13 Million dollar overrun for a total cost of $40 Million dollars. You may recall at the time of the twinning their was no talk of replacing the Camerson St. bridge because of heavy traffic. In fact part of the idea of twinning the John Hart was to take some traffic off the Cameron St. Bridge.

3. We are now being told because of the increased traffic we need a new bridge to replace the Cameron St. Bridge. One of the excuses used to justify the new Bridge is that the Cameron St. bridge is old and must be replaced. Some Facts.

There is no increased traffic crossing the Cameron St. Bridge in fact traffic in the last few years has actually decreased. You have not seen any definitive studies to back up the claim of increased traffic. The flawed information the City is using was garnered over 5 years ago and traffic has decreased significantly since then.

The cost of a new bridge in a different location has been estimated at $22 Million dollars. The cost of a super structure on the existing cement abutments if feasible will be in the range of $ $6/7 Million. Over and above the $195,000.00 cost to see if the cement abutments can be used.

The cost to repair the existing Cameron St. Bridge including resurfacing would be $724,000.00 . I suggest this figure is high because the City wants a new bridge. It would probably cost less if it was closely looked into.

You dont have to be a genius to figure out what option makes sense. The one way bridge has been in place for years and serves the needs of those using it perfectly. There is absolutley no need for a new bridge. So why are we building it? Who asked for it? If the old Bridge was repaired do you think the Citizens of Prince George would be upset, not likely.

Our Mayor Colin Kinsley has always been harping for a new Cameron St. bridge. Maybe he wants it named after him. If we build a new one it should be called Colins Folly.

Contractors would like a New Bridge because it means more money for their companys.

Our City Planning people want a new bridge because it means more work, which means job security.

The argument that the cost of a new bridge will be shared by 3 levels of Government is used to make us beleive we are getting some sort of a deal, when in fact all 3 levels of Government get their money from our tax dollars. We pay for it all.

There is no pressure from taxpayers for a new bridge, they can live quite well with a repaired Camerson St. bridge. This issue is being pushed by vested interest groups.

Ask yourselfs this. How may people do you know,that are pushing the BC lotteries commission, or the City of Prince George for a gaming centre downtown. The answer would very few or none. So who wants it.

Answer. The vested interest groups.

The same applies to this bridge. Its not needed, its not wanted, it will fill no more of a need than the present bridge.

Bond is in favour of this bridge at this time to offset her announcement that she would not support putting $5million into saving King George the 5th. school. It gives the impression she has taken an interest, however the money will not come out of her budget.

We do not need this bridge, to think otherwise is foolish.

My guess is that the Politicians knowing that most voters, and especially those in Prince George are completely gullible and have no idea what is happening to their tax dollars will go ahead and build this bridge. We will then have 3 bridges across one river within 1 1/2 miles of each other. I defy anyone to find a similar situation in a City of similiar size anywhere in the world. These three bridges will be a testament of our waste and stupidity.

I agree Palopy. It is vested interest that wants the bridge. I wish there was some way my tax dollars didn't have to go into it if they bull ahead. Thanks for your comprehensive insight.

Palopou ....

The city has the Nechako Crossing Study of 2003 on the net in which they looked at the three options of crossing locations.

# 1 was at the existing crossing

#3 was at Cottonwood Park

#2 was between the two

The engineers recommended #2 as having the best cost:benefit ratio.

Council decided against #2. Try to find out why, and they say some sort of mumbo jumbo about the Victoria Street extension across CN tracks.

The problem is, that the engineers looked at the influence of that extension on all three. The result is that it would improve all three projected volumes, but not to any great degree.

So, the two way peak hour volumes for the options are (without Victoria street flyover)

#1 = 1383
#2 = 1246
#3 = 994

With Victoria St flyover

#1 = 1425
#2 = 1570
#3 = 1061

Cost of bridges without Victoria St flyover (2003$)

#1 = $19.5M
#2 = $9.0M
#3 = $11.9M

Victoria flyover cost varies depending on how many tracks CN may remover, however, it was $15.1M as worst case.

Not surprisingly, the engineering report concluded:

"Option 2 was found to have the highest Net Present Value at $12.1 million, the highest benefit Cost Ratio at 2.8 and the lowest capital Cost. Option 2 provides the best value for money and is therefore recommended as the preferred option."

So, the question I have not had anyone on Council, including the mayor, answer with any rationality is:

"Why have you not gone with the engineering recommendation?"

http://www.city.pg.bc.ca/city_services/infrastructure/nechako_study/nechako_final_report.pdf

As far as Bond goes?

I would not be surprised she saw the Mayor and talked about the bridge rather than the school.

I did not realize she is the Minister responsible for transportation and has any more expertise in the matter than we do.

Look at it this way The City of Vancouver with water on three sides had almost a million people and had only three bridges. A person living at Ness Lake and commutes to Prince George daily to work in the downtown area said we need the Cameron Street Bridge. How they would get tp Prince George is a mystery as they must be blind.
Thats a great idea splitting the cost three ways. Makes you think the money is coming from heaven but like polapu said its all our money.

>"The cost to repair the existing Cameron St. Bridge including resurfacing would be $724,000.00<"

This assumes that the piers are still in good shape. If they are, that would be a reasonable solution to the problem.

But, the mayor wants a new bridge - that is what it is going to be, one way or the other, going by other issues that were rammed through in the past.

Bond is probably just responding to extreme lobbying...what else can she do?

BTW: Ministers in any government have been given portfolios that they had no qualifications of any kind for, like when Lois Boone was our NDP highways minister.

They are expected to learn quickly. Sometimes they do, sometimes they don't.

Could Bond be trying to get more Liberal votes. It is so close to the Federal election that I wonder?

In view of Owl's excellent report of what is going on with the Victoria Street crossing; my question is "wouldn't a gung ho journalist be questioning the City as to why the Victoria Street crossing was rejected." Or are our journalists' hands tied like City Hall?

With due respect to Gordon Hoegstra, who is the best we have in the conventional media, and the occassional forray into that the realm of investigative journalism by the editors of this site, we really do not have any quality investigative journalism in this community.

Journalists report on the events without comment, and even that they get wrong far too often.

Look at the newspaper front page today at the Rich Coleman "belief" that "stumpage bingo" is the cause of logging truck fatalities in the Northern Interior.

If I had been the reporter I would have asked the obvious question: "So do you then feel that traffic volume on forestry roads is not one of the causes of accidents and deaths?"

And if he would have sidestepped the question, I would have reported that. It does not take a rocket scientist to figure out that increased traffic on roads not designed for such traffic is one of the causes of accidents.

Around here, politicians can get away with almost anything they say and simply use their position rather than their knowledge to give the statement credibility.

As far as Ministers not having expertise in the area which they adminster, that is the norm. However, Minister Bond is the Minister of Education, not Transportation. While she can observe the same unsafe conditions we can all observe as a result of the bridge shut-down, she would not have a good overview on what the best solution is from a Provincial and National road network point of view. So, to say that the bridge should be rebuilt is suggesting a solution which may be neither in the short nor long term interest.

To say that the present condition is unacceptable and that she will push to get the province involve to seek the best solution ... well, that would have been quite appropriate in my opinion.

I keep making the mistake of not writing in an editor and just attempting to use this little text window provided.

So, it is Hoekstra and Coleman stated that Stumpage Bingo is NOT the cause .....

sorry ... I'll get it right one of these days....

Percy said:

"Now were talking. A three way cost split. Isn't is encouraging when we can all work together. Everyone can consider participating if they only have to kick in 1/3. Percy"

I think Percy has it right! Kamloops has ALWAYS adopted this "take any grant" attitude and look what it got them: Bridges, overpasses, pedestrian overpasses and 4-6 lane freeways everywhere that seem to rival those in Tacoma or Portland, Oregon!

During the years when Kamloops was going after every transfer dollar Prince George was languishing in idle, turning down available grants while other towns grabbed them!

Sometimes being too timid can be a bad thing.

I like to think of them as transfer dollars ...

Money being transferred back to PG rather than being spent somewhere else.

While provincila and federal funds are also our dollars, there is a much larger proportion of that comes from other taxpayers so we should take advantage of that.

The grant system is hardly an incentive to save or invest wisely, is it?

In order to understand this Bridge question, we must first ask the Question. Do we need a new bridge across the Nechako to service a limited number of trucks and vehicles, keeping in mind that we have 2 alternative bridges (8 lanes) within a mile and a half of this bridge. We can make an argument to repair the present bridge including new decking for $724,000.00 or less and maybe spend an additional $750,000.00 in repairs over the next 10 years. This would give us a bridge that would easily handle the available traffic for the next 10 years or more for $1,400,000.00.

The City is not interested in this Option and can only lamely state that to repair the present Bridge it would cost $724,000.00 and would need repairs in the future. They never mention that the maintenance of the Bridge was part of their agreement when they took it over from the Provincial Government for $1.00.

Some thoughts.

1. I beleive that the City knows that it will not get funding from the Federal or Provincial Government to build a new bridge (22.4 Million). One reason would be that the Province has allocated money to twin the Simon Fraser Bridge, Widen the highway between Prince George, and Quesnel, put in a new scale south of Pr George and hopefully widen and put in some passing lanes on Highway 16 west. This will amount to a significant amount of spending and I doubt they would spend more on a bridge that obviously they dont think is necessary as they gave it to the city for $1.00. The Feds probably dont have any jurisdiction in the matter as Highways are a Provincial responsibility, so why would they put funds into it.
2. The City is now paying for a feasibility study to see if the Concrete Piers under the Wooden Cameron St. bridge will be capable of supporting a steel superstructure. They already know that these Piers will support a wooden structure, so people should not be confused. The study is for the New Steel Superstructure. If the Concrete Piers are ok or can be rehabilitated at a reasonable cost then they will go ahead with the option of building a new steel superstructure probably 2 lane bridge at the present location on the present Concrete Piers. The intent is to inspect one concrete pier and if it is ok then they will assume that the other four are ok.

3. The cost of the new steel superstructure has not been released yet, however rumour has it that it will be in the area of 7/8 Million dollars, which should include the $190,000.00 for the feasibility study.

4. Lets assume that the City knows that Provincial/Federal funding is not forthcoming, however up to this point in time they have been conditioning us to beleive that we need a new bridge, then the next part of the scenario is this line.
**Although the Province/Feds will not give us any money for this bridge, if they had then it would be a 3 way split and our portion would have been $7 million. So we are going to go ahead and build this new steel superstructure bridge for $7 Million because that is the amount we would have paid out if they had supported us.

5. A footnote to the above scenario is that Bond/or The Minister of Transport might give the City one or two million to help offset the cost of the bridge because this would be money they would have to spend on the Intersection of 5th Avenue and 97 if they bridge was not built, because that would be a Provincial responsibility.

These are some thoughts up to this point. In addition if we repaired the Cameron St. bridge it would be up and running probably by May/June of this year at the latest. The feasibility study for the new bridge will not be completed until May. This means that the Camerson ST. Brige will be closed for 8/9 Months before anything is done. Then there will be an additinal 1 1/2 to 2 years before it is built. Lets say 2 1/2 years without this bridge. Do we really need it, and if we do then we should be repairing it and getting it back in service and not thinking about a new bridge.
Another thought. If the concrete piers under the Cameron St. Bridge are found to be defective when this bridge was built in 1931, then do you suppose that the concrete piers under the CN Steel Bridge over the Fraser river which was built around 1918 (same type of piers) would also be defective. A point to ponder.

Common sense says we should repair this bridge and get on with our lives. We shouldnt have to be constantly going after our elected representatives to do the right thing. That is after all their responsibility, that is what we pay them for.

6. If in fact their was money available from the Province/Feds it could be directed to paving some roads in this city. You can always hear the City harping about the cost of maintenance for the Camerson St. bridge, however did you ever see them put out a figure on the cost of constantly having crews filling potholes with asphalt, year, after year,after year. Of course not.

I wonder who will get the contract to build the New Steel Superstructure Bridge. Anyone care to guess??

Has anyone noticed the potholes which are buildng up on 5th between Carney and Central? They repaved the section east of Carney recently. The section they did not do has cracks the entire width of the road every 30 metres or so and these are taking a beating from the freeze thaw cycles of our weather plus the heavy transport vehicles now using this route.

What is the real problem? The mills which are on River Road have had a city grow up around them and the City has not maintained proper road access to them.

So, what is the option? Provide better access, or choke them out over time? Most cities and their inner city Heavy Industrial properties, and that is what they are, eventually have to cut their ties. I think the time has come for a move in the near future.

I think you are right Palopy, we don't need a new bridge. As Owl suggests if it is just to service River Road, which I think it is and also those people on the Hart au gratin,(Gratton) why should the people that live South of the River subsidize the bridge? If it should happen then it should be a toll bridge otherwise it is just not fair to the wide majority of taxpayers. Who pays for all the road repairs all this traffic is costing us? I suggest the people in the bowl are. The surprising part is that they are not yelling "unfair".