In a multi-million dollar exercise in bait-and-switch, renewed plans for an expanded Bridge Terminal lack all the design aspects that won over community support last year.
In early 2010, Metro Transit announced it wanted to expand the terminal by paving over six acres of land on the Dartmouth Common designated as the Wilderness Park. That idea was roundly criticized for taking park land, for coming too close to Dartmouth High School and for not being particularly wheelchair-friendly.
Through a series of public meetings, however, the plan was tweaked in a number of ways: the terminal was to be hidden from the school by placing it below an intervening hill, and a pedestrian bridge addressed accessibility issues while giving the terminal a striking, architecturally pleasing look. With those changes, there was begrudging, if not complete, community support for the project.
But budgeted for $9.5 million, bids for construction came in at $12.1 million. On their own accord, and without consulting city council, city staff have pared the cost back by removing the pedestrian bridge and by raising the terminal five feet, requiring less excavation. In short, the budget was met by ejecting everything in the compromise plan that neighbours and the school community had liked. (Disclosure: I live in the neighbourhood.)
Told of the new plans at Tuesday’s meeting of regional council, Dartmouth councillors Jim Smith and Gloria McCluskey were clearly not pleased. The matter will come back before the full council in two weeks, and before Dartmouth Community council February 3, but unless council nixes the plan, the stripped down plan will go out to bid the following week, with construction starting in April.
This article appears in Jan 13-19, 2011.
Love the Way We Lose!
Pyritic slate wins once again. Everyone in the area knew what the problem would be.
At some point our council may wake up and get sick of being deceived and treated like mushrooms.
Is it bait and switch, or just HRM/MT staff incompetence? I would suggest the latter, based on everything else that HRM does incompetently.
What a disapointment! I really can’t believe this. dartmouth residents are treated like pigeons at council. I think if City Council wanted to put a garbage dump on the Dartmouth Common there is nothing Dartmouthians could do. Nothing. A classic bait and switch!
True, Bait&Switch would imply intent which would suggest planning on HRM’s part, and we know they can’t look more than 5 minutes into the future.
There is a choice to be had here: are people willing to pay (from your tax money!) the extra 3 million dollars for those things which you asked for? I am sure the city viewed them as a desirable, but not a necessity. Be fair here; a new terminal is a necessity, 3 million dollars extra of excavation + a fancy pedestrian bridge is not really necessary. Looks pretty, yes thats nice… but we need this terminal ASAP and 3 million dollars is not chump change.
and Bo Gus; Just because council is a circus doesn’t mean the staff at HRM are.
The staff at council are usually the problem – all of the solutions are based on their so called expertise, and being the unelected, unaccountable people they are, there is no redress for their ignorant and usually self serving reports and conclusions
@longwalker: In this case, 3 million dollars is, for all intents and purposes, chump change ($2.6M moreso, but who’s counting?). What it costs to build the terminal that was presented is the cost of doing right by the residents of this city, and, as Cranky said below, if the council as a whole was capable of looking more than 5 minutes into the future, they would see that.
What’s disturbing is that we think $9.5 million is OK, and we’re mostly quibbling about the fact that it’s an extra 3 million over. Let’s sit back a bit and take stock of what it is we really need – 6 or so acres of land of which 90 percent or more is paved. Let’s say that we fork out that “extra” 3 million just for the paving…that works out to about 11 or 12 bucks a square foot, which is pretty luxurious paving. It is just a parking lot after all…let’s not forget that.
So then you need the other 9 or 9.5 million for the building? What the hell for? You want a flat platform with a roof, doesn’t need to be beautiful, and give it some washrooms. It doesn’t need heating except maybe just in the washrooms proper…are we that pussy all of a sudden?
Seriously, this blows me away. I think people are losing sight of the value of money. It’s not that devalued yet.
dartmouthy; self serving, unaccountable, ignorant, and self serving are the words you use to describe the staff at HRM. Do you work with any of these people, at all? Probably not. There are things called professional designations (Chartered Accountant, Professional Engineer, etc etc) that HOLD people to standards. If those professionals do not perform ethically, thier designation can be stripped. It does happen. If you were an Engineer for the city, what POSSIBLE reason could you have to falsify your professional opinion? People are honestly rediculous when it comes to things like this. Yes there are things wrong in this city but it is hardly a result of malicious intent on the part of the HRM staff.
longwalker: to your point about PEngs and CPAs with professional codes of ethics, and really any other profession with formal codes that are similar, it’s not really relevant. One, how many city staffers with influence on these decisions are formally bound by these codes? Two, you’d hope that *anyone* would have that kind of ethic. Three, and most important in my opinion, these professional codes of ethics frequently require a practitioner to hold safety, health and welfare of the public paramount, and to not operate outside the areas of their competence. Both of these are individual judgment calls – the engineer has to assess *herself* to decide her competency, which is sometimes a dubious proposition (how does an incompetent person realize that they are?), and one person’s idea of public welfare can be light-years different from another person’s idea of public welfare.
I’d agree with you that city staffers are quite unlikely to be malicious or deliberately inept. But considering all the badly-designed, inappropriate and cost-ineffective roads, buildings and other structures that professional engineers and architects have perpetrated over the years, no doubt with the best of motives, I wouldn’t be going overboard in extolling their virtues either.
As for self-serving, let’s do a research study some time to look at how many city planners have current close ties with developers or builders, or have moved into the private sector after a decade or two of deciding who to give public money to.
I can’t wait to get a car and be finished with Busses once and for all.
longwalker – at a public hearing in December a member of the public pointed out that the plans and aerial photos (taken from Google Earth) were inaccurate as they showed Greenvale school before it became enlarged into Greenvale lofts. Watching on TV I found it quite amusing until I went on Google Earth to check the claim and discovered the image is from 2003. When questioned by a councillor the planner admitted the statements of the person were correct.
What words would you use to describe the documents and presentation from the professional planner ?
And what words would you use to describe staff who never informed the council as to the cost of removing the slate before building the bridge bus terminal ?
Realist: I see your points, well made certainly. I do however have a comment; The Association of Professional Engineers NS, as well as the engineering community in general, is littered with “people who know people” much like the rest of this province. Word spreads quickly about people operating unethically, likewise who is always dependable to do good work. I find it hard to believe that the other professional associations are any different (TechNova, ICANS, etc). I’m not sure how long people like that last.
Joeblow: Anyone could make the mistake of using an old image, yes it was a mistake but I doubt it really points out a true inadequacy on the part of the staff member. As for the pyritic slate problem, I’m sure it was brought up and the conclusion was exactly what you see; that they would attempt to tender as the public wanted, and if the cost was too high they would regroup and re-evaluate. Back to the original point; I still don’t see the bait-and-switch. Council now knows of the revised plan, and will vote on it “in two weeks time”. If you don’t like the new proposal, let your councilor know.
Ever notice how when unpopular proposals are made, protesters are allowed to vent and then the project goes ahead anyway? This looks like a case of doing whatever it takes to achieve the goal. Doesn’t matter how many people disaprove of this new facility. It will be pushed through anyway because the decision has already been made. The rest is just due process.
I still think they should have put further (any, actually, would’ve been nice) consideration into either building the terminal at the Ferry Terminal instead where there is tons of derelict lands opposite Alderney Gate and Belmont House (North of the railway tracks), or splitting them up into two smaller ones – one to service east and south Dartmouth routes at Alderney (where there is already washroom facilities), and one at the bridge for the north Dartmouth and Sackville routes (where all they would have to modify is build some sort of structure with a bathroom and perhaps a kiosk).
Then again that would save money, would make sense, and wouldn’t reward local construction firms and engineers with generous tax payer funded contracts. So it’ll never happen.
Likely not going to be a safe space, in general, for people no matter what they build, unless they have a police presence and that is unlikely.
Seems like some in the community would like budgets to be scrutinized in order to avoid tax hikes, fee hikes etc. except of course when it comes to a project in their own backyard, can’t have it both ways but as the saying goes “against ignorance even the gods battle in vain”
I live in Dartmouth and I don’t think the plan as is, going ahead is the right course of action… too bad there are others out there as you suggest.