OTTAWA CITIZEN, by Catherine Morrison
Officials from Public Services and Procurement Canada held a news conference on Wednesday to provide an update on the Alexandra Bridge project. However, the group failed to answer questions related to the cost of replacing the bridge.
Stefan Dery, PSPC’s director general of infrastructure asset management, emphasized that repairing and retaining the bridge, which daily services about 4,000 pedestrians and cyclists, and carries 10 per cent of vehicle traffic between Ottawa and Gatineau, is “simply not a feasible option.”
“Mitigation activities alone cannot sufficiently address the technical risks related to the structure’s current deterioration,” Dery said. “The investments we’re making right now are temporary until we can launch the process of replacing the bridge completely.”
When pressed about the project’s cost, the officials noted only that 2018 figures showed replacing the bridge would cost $800 million.
“We do have a budget, we do have a cost that we’re working towards. It’s not like we’re doing this blindly. It’s just that I’m not sure if we can share that publicly at this point, at this time,” Lebrun said.
The officials shared that “a lot has happened” since 2018, including the COVID-19 pandemic and inflation, meaning there may be “some level of escalation” in cost for the project.
They shared that $800 million was a “starting point” and that, based on the 2018 analysis, repairing the bridge would cost between $200 million and $300 million more, though that was no longer an option, based on technical analyses.
“We’ll obviously have a little bit more clarity in terms of costs in the coming months,” said Dery, who added there would be a net benefit to replacing the aging Alexandra Bridge since having to regularly close a bridge created economic instability. “We do need to be sensitive around communicating project numbers as we advance into a procurement, competitive selection process.”
Alexandre Baillairgé-Charbonneau, a spokesperson for PSPC, said in an email Thursday that the department could not provide an updated estimate of the bridge replacement cost.
Another spokesperson, Jeremy Link, said the government awarded a contract with an initial value of $31.98 million to Pomerleau Inc. in 2023 to perform essential maintenance to keep the bridge safe and in service until deconstruction.
“For the replacement project, we are currently in the early design phase of the project and are developing design concepts that will meet the National Capital Commission’s Performance Criteria for Bridge Design,” Link said. “These concepts will take into consideration input from Indigenous communities, the public and stakeholders. Details related to the project will be confirmed at a later date.”
PSPC was mandated by the federal government to replace the bridge in 2019.
In August 2023, PSPC announced that the bridge would be shut down to vehicles for a year “to perform essential rehabilitation and repairs to keep the bridge safe and in service until deconstruction.” It said one lane of the bridge would remain accessible to pedestrians and cyclists.