A Commentary by Doug Draper
With little more than 19 weeks left until the next provincial election, hardly a weekday goes by when I don’t get at least one media release from the Conservatives or NDP, or from any one of a number of citizen groups slamming Dalton McGuinty’s Liberal government.
Ontario Transportation Minister Kathleen Wynne
Suffice to say, this columnist has done his share of criticizing too – especially when it comes to the way McGuinty and company have sat back and allowed the Niagara Health System to set plans for most of the hospital services in this region. I’ve no doubt that this issue alone could cost the Liberals thousands of votes in this region and could cost Kim Craitor, a decent, hardworking Liberal MPP, his seat in a Niagara Falls riding that includes Fort Erie where, more than a year ago, the emergency room at the hospital in that community was closed.
The way McGuinty’s health minister, Deb Matthews, has so brushed aside calls from Craitor and others, including thousands of his constituents, seven of Niagara’s local municipalities and the regional government for an open and independent investigation of the way the NHS has been managing our hospital services, it is almost as if the Liberal brass have decided to throw Craitor under the bus.
Even if Matthews relents and agrees to an investigation now (after the better part of a year of Niagara residents, municipal leaders and Craitor pressing for one) it may be viewed as a cynical move in front of an election, and one where the timing is such that the findings would likely never be released, let alone reached, prior to the Oct. 6 vote anyhow.
Yet there are reasons to praise McGuinty and his Liberals for initiatives that will hopefully leave a lasting legacy for good planning in this region. They have been right on at least a few things that impact Niagara profoundly, including the establishment of a greenbelt to protect what is left of the region’s grape and tender-fruit growing lands from the cement and asphalt trucks.
Another is the decision the McGuinty Liberals made shortly after they came to power almost eight years go to place plans supported by the former Conservative government and Niagara’s regional government to construct a new 400-series highway – commonly referred to as a ‘mid-peninsula highway’- between the Burlington-Hamilton area and the QEW as it approaches the Peace Bridge in Fort Erie, under a full environmental assessment review.
The Conservatives had placed the plan for the highway, which would cut a swath south of the Niagara Escarpment and through rural lands in West Lincoln, Pelham and onward through Welland to Fort Erie, under a less stringent environmental protection review. And just about all that level of review meant was that the highway would almost certainly be built, at an estimated cost a decade ago of at least $1.2 billion, and with very few ifs, ands or buts. It would be more a matter of trying not to cut through “provincially significant wetlands” or other natural features of that sort before pouring the pavement.
By placing the highway plan under a full environmental assessment, the province’s Ministry of Transportation, in consultation with other government bodies and residents across the region, had no choice but to look at the larger transportation picture and explore as many other alternatives as possible to a new highway.
In that spirit, the ministry held an open house in Welland a year ago this spring where it was revealed that continued review over the past half a dozen or so years has placed other strategies, including expanding existing highways like the 406, and improving rail and other transit services, on the front burner and shoved the mid-pen to the back for at least the next two decades.
Fortunately, during the recent Niagara Week at Queen’s Park, the province’s minister of transportation, Kathleen Wynne, appears to have supported that position while meeting with regional council representatives anxious to get the mid-pen highway plan back on the road. The minister, who told me last year in an interview that she wants to see more of a balance between truck and car traffic and other means of moving people and goods around, told the councillors she’s all in favour of moving forward with an expanded 406 and 400-series cutoff to the QEW as a ‘mini mid-pen’ alternative.
On this one, the Liberals have been spot on and so in contrast to the Tim Hudak Conservatives who vow to see the building of this highway if they form the next provincial government.
(We encourage you to hare your comments on this issue below and tell all of your friends and associates to visit Niagara At Large at www.niagaraatlarge.com for more news and commentary on matters of interest and concern to residents in our greater Niagara region and beyond.)
Niagara At Large 
Doug Draper is to be commended for the attention he gives to the important issue of the mid-peninsula highway, which is the single greatest threat to the environment in Ontario. With the serious threats to global and lcoal ecology, such as loss of species and climate change, government actions need to be co-ordinated to shift the province in a greener direction. Nothing that is being proposed is more contrary to this than the proposed mid-peninsula expressway.
I suspect that while Doug Draper and I feel quite passionately about this issue is that we both spent a lot of effort to secure the demise of the proposed toxic waste incinerator in West Lincoln. I am sure that he would agree with me that we don’t want our success in protecting farm land here to be a short term success, that was underminded by a highway promoting urban sprawl.
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I would like someone to tell me why many people in Grimsby, South Lincoln etc. oppose wind turbines.
Wind turbines DO NOT affect health or real estate values.
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Our woeful transportation system needs to be addressed to ensure our economic future. In answer to your question Mark as to why Grimsby and West Lincoln don’t want wind turbines- they are hideous and ugly and will affect real estate values on homes close to urban areas or property with escarpment vistas. A mechanism should be in place to ensure property owners re-assessment and compensation when their property values tank. I’ve read the Berkeley brain aching study of this subject as well as others and it proves one thing. You can always make the data fit the predetermined conclusion.
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Hideous and ugly? They’ve searched all over (U.S, Europe, Canada) for studies indicating that wind turbines impacet real estate values. Not one credible study states that they do. That being said, if they haven’t commissioned a report (i.e Canning Consultants and John Simmons Realty Services,”Wind Energy Study — Effect On Real Estate Values in the Municipality of Chatham-Kent, Ontario) then they should. There is also no legitimate scientific data which indicates that wind turbines impact human health.
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I would speculate that if the public manufactured the perception that wind turbines are a blight, hideous, and ugly, then it might impact real estate values somewhat during construction, but even then, it would be very temporary and insignificant.
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Call me a silly old fool but I think wind turbines look cool and, if there are no health effects, I wouldn’t object to any nearby. Maybe the government could actually subsidize people who install their own wind and solar generating equipment making power generating more economical, more eco friendly and the public less reliant on public utilities. I would install such features if I could afford to. This would help the government meet its environmental goals (if they actually have any) considerably.
The public utilities and private businesses also should use night sky friendly lighting (I sent to the US for night friendly fixtures which shine down only and use a fraction of the electricity of conventional lighting – 7 to 13 watt bulbs – and most have motion detectors) so we can enjoy the night sky and it would cause less havoc with the life cycles of animals. So much energy is wasted lighting up the sky for no reason………….but we are getting off topic.
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I’d like to see some of these night sky friendly fixtures. Is there a website that features them?
According to the Chief Medical Officer of Health, May 2010, “the scientific evidence available to date does not demonstrate a direct causal link between wind turbine noise and adverse health effects.”
When are we going to stop attacking real science?
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Mark, in spite of being off topic, excuse me, just look up night sky or eco friendly lighting. I got my stuff from Denver but there are likely places here by now. Light pollution is, to me, another negative aspect of “progress”, especially since I’m into astronomy and it has deleterious effects on humans and animals.
A new highway would certainly damage sensitive areas, increase light and air pollution and promote more urban sprawl with its related problems so adding to what is already there would likely be best environmentally. Who wants to live beside a major turnpike? Not me. That’s why I’m in the country – what little is left of it around here.
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I’ve read the Chatham-Kent study and familiar with the area having lived in Chatham-Kent. It is sparsely populated rural/agricultural and all housing prices are depressed. Move east towards Point Pelee or west towards Erieau and Rondeau it would be a different story.
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Normally I would not comment on this subject (Mid-Pen) because I was involved in the study.
But what I cannot understand is how and why the discussion has jumped to wind turbines!
I guess some people will try to turn any discussion to their pet peeve!
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I take the blame, but there is some common ground between wind turbines and the proposed Mid-Pen Highway: turbines are environmentally and economically progressive, while the proposed highway represents environmental and economic regression.
Planners should be focussing on High Speed Rail instead of additional highways. The extension of the GO to Grimsby is a good start, but if we were to ramp up the HSR development our economy and environment would benefit by leaps and bounds.
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Wind turbines are off-topic when it comes to discussing the Mid-Pen, NGTA or any other transportation study.
Suggesting high-speed rail as a solution to potential transportation problems in southern Ontario/Niagara is a narrow, simplistic and unrealistic idea! Don’t get me wrong – I am a railfan of the first order – trains have been my hobby for more than 50 years. We need more commuter rail – high speed rail is more for distances of over 200 km.
And if you actually read what the MTO study has suggested, you will see that ALL options have been considered including greater use of rail – both for passengers AND for freight. The larger problem is not passenger transport – but moving freight between the GTA and the US border.
I have seen too many people say “more rail” or “high-speed rail” or “ships across the lake” etc etc. There is no single solution! It will take a variety of solutions. And if the planning and prep work is not done now, things will only get much, much worse in the future.
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I’m not a specialist in transportation systems, but that could be my advantage. I’ve lived in Europe, and I’ve seen how far ahead they are in transportation systems. High Speed Rail would absolutely alleviate congestion problems in and out of Toronto, and elsewhere.
Suggesting that High Speed Rail is narrow, simplistic, or unrealistic is in itself an insular and provincial view, shared by too many North Americans. North Americans have a “car culture” philosophy which prevents us from moving in the right direction in transportation. We need to remove the massive subsidies from fossil fuel industries and redirect them to Green alternatives, and a mid-Pen highway is NOT the way to be spending those monies.
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Currently, freight and passenger trains share the same tracks. If we had dedicated tracks: one for freight, and another for passengers, both people and freight would move faster, all the way to the U.S and elsewhere. Where’s the vision?
Highways necessarily encourage car and truck use, so more highways equals more cars (and trucks). Increased fuel costs and fewer highways will prod us to consider the alternatives more seriously.
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Like I have always said, I don’t normally comment on commentaries I’ve done on this site. But what is all of this obsession with wind turbines when we are trying to talk about a super highway proposal that would jab through one of best agro/bread basket areas in the Niagara, and possibly take a match that would pave it over forever. I am kind of getting to the point with this wind turbine thing, which reminds me about the fruitless fight over flouride in our drinking water, that I don’t want to hear much more about it again, even though I think wind turbines are a good idea and have been proven to be so in a few pioneering states in the U.S. like Vermont. I agree with Will McKenzie that a discussion about the mid-pen highway should certainly be about the mid-pen highway and reasonable plans for a host of transport plans, including rail, public transit, car pooling, etc., that make sense. But to turn this into a discussion about wind turbines?!!! Come on. By the way, I know this guy Will. He is a retired MTO person who has a passion for rail transport, which says alot for someone from and MTO that has often been dubbed ‘the department of highways’, which it once was. So give him a break okay. You might find out you are more or less on the same page.
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As much as I hate to admit this, on the Mid-Pen Dolton’s Lieberals are correct, and Tim’s Conartists wrong, for reasons…
1. This hiway is unnecessary. The blockage isn’t between Niagara Falls and Fort Drearie. It’s between Miserysawga, Jokeville, and Burlington. After that the QEW traffic is light, except during summer weekends.
2. Fuel prices aren’t ever coming down. Who can afford to drive on it? The Amish and Mennonite horse wagons maybe. Cyclists too.
3. Those who think a hiway will bring money, people, and jobs have only to drive along hiway 20 to see how wrong they are. Or the miles and miles of desolate landscape along the 401 east of Toronto. Or the New York Thruway to the east, if you’re more familiar with that.
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My priorities would be better public transit of all types, including rail, as well as interconnected regional and intra-urban transit. This thinking (about the mid Pen) is exactly why Niagara was left out of the plans laid by Metrolinx. We have to move away from our “car culture”. Highways are made to be driven on … if you don’t drive, you are still being asked to pay for it through your taxes, but you will never get to benefit. To the contrary, public transit including rail, interlinking bus and light rail lines, are also funded by taxes, but at least everybody gets to use it or benefit from it, even if you choose not to use public transit. But if you wanted to, you can.
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