Plans to build an Edmonton LRT line to St. Albert’s long-envisioned park and ride have been saved from being considered a low priority for Edmonton.
City of Edmonton staff recently presented a proposed prioritization list for building LRT projects. Extending the Metro line all the way to Campbell Road – where St. Albert plans to build a park and ride eventually – was initially ranked low, 10th out of 14 projects.
Since then, Edmonton city council has decided to forgo ranking all the possible LRT projects in the city with the exception of the next two. The plan is to prioritize the west leg of the LRT to Lewis Farms and to extend the Metro line to Blatchford, and to start doing design work on the rest of the proposed routes.
Edmonton Coun. Bev Esslinger said it’s good news that the Castledowns to Campbell Road section of the Metro line is no longer facing a low ranking on that proposed priorities list. An extension of the Metro line from Blatchford to Castledowns was ranked fifth.
“This is really moving it forward,” she said.
Esslinger is the councillor for Edmonton’s Ward 2, which borders St. Albert. She said the LRT is important to her area of the city because right now many residents of her ward don’t have easy access to an LRT line.
There are a lot of different opinions on what the LRT priorities should be, she said.
Regional conversations are important, she said. One of the things that lowered the initial ranking was regional participation, but she disagreed. She’d just talked to St. Albert Mayor Nolan Crouse about St. Albert’s plans for the Campbell Park and Ride.
“I just said that I think we have a positive tone that I’d felt from the mayor (Crouse) that morning,” she said.
Crouse said Edmonton has to do to its LRT planning based on what’s best for that city.
“Nothing surprised me about not moving north towards St. Albert at this point,” Crouse said.
He said it might be different if the park and ride, which has been long planned but has been delayed due to various negotiations with the province and the City of Edmonton, was around to show demand from the north. The province is set to sell the land to St. Albert.
But it’s still going to be awhile before Campbell Park and Ride is built, as details over design are hammered out with the City of Edmonton. The land is in the City of Edmonton so has to be up to that municipality’s engineering standards, even once it is officially purchased by St. Albert from the province.
That St. Albert can’t show a regional interest in LRT coming to Campbell Road isn’t the fault of Edmonton, Crouse said.
“That’s not Edmonton’s problem, that’s between us and the province,” he said of the sale of land to St. Albert.
Both he and Esslinger are pleased that the federal government has committed to transit funding in the recent budget.
