By Jon Willing, Ottawa Sun, May 14, 2014
Another $2.3 million has been tacked on to the cost of the O-Train expansion project, according to a report for the transit commission.
OC Transpo was expecting to save up to $1.3 million in relief from duty fees on the six new trains manufactured by Alstom in Europe. According to the report, Transpo was counting on the fee break based on the Canada-European Union free trade agreement. However, the Ministry of Finance denied the city's application.
By Tom Spears, Ottawa Citizen, May 11, 2014
OTTAWA — Cathy and Paul Keddy, biologists and nature lovers, spent 40 years saving and borrowing to buy a square mile of Lanark County’s most natural land.
Now they have given it legal protection as a nature sanctuary for 999 years.
By Joanne Chianello, Ottawa Citizen, May 13, 2014
Ottawa Mayor Jim Watson has sent a questionnaire to the provincial party leaders requesting yes-or-no answers to key issues the mayor characterized as “of vital importance to the future of the city.”
At the top of the list: funding the Ottawa River Action Plan and the second phase of light rail. The yes-or-no questions lay out the estimated cost of each of the projects and whether each leader agrees to fund its share — $65 million for the river clean up and $975 million for expanding light rail by 35 kilometres.
By Matthew Pearson and Michael Woods, Ottawa Citizen, May 14, 2014
Scott-Albert corridor plan approved
Additional safety measures for the Scott-Albert corridor have been approved in a bid to make the route safer for pedestrians and cyclists.
More than 2,500 OC Transpo buses will be detoured every day onto Scott and Albert streets starting in 2016 while the Transitway is converted to light rail.
By David Reevely, Ottawa Citizen, May 12, 2014
Holding down electricity prices would create 40,000 jobs in Ontario, Progressive Conservative leader Tim Hudak promised Monday morning.
Instead of wind and solar farms, Hudak said, a Tory-run Ontario would rely on the “workhorses of our system”: hydro dams and gas and nuclear generating stations. The idea is to stabilize prices — not to lower them, despite the Tories’ hot rhetoric, but to head off further increases after the doubling of the average price of electricity in Ontario in the last decade or so.
By Chris Holski, CFRA News, May 12, 2014
The segregated bike lane on Laurier is about to be used for the millionth time.
A weight-triggered counter has been keeping track of each trip.
It should reach 1,000,000 on Tuesday morning.
