State-of-good repair projects just as important as mega-works: RCCAO submission
The Residential and Civil Construction Alliance of Ontario (RCCAO) has called on the federal government to take a series of bold steps to help correct Canada’s infrastructure deficit and ensure transit, waterworks and roads and bridges are built and repaired to sufficiently accommodate growth.
In its submission to Infrastructure Canada’s National Infrastructure Assessment exercise, RCCAO urges the federal government to keep focus on building and repairing critical infrastructure. The submission explains that growth in the Greater Golden Horseshoe area of the province is expected to bring in one million new people every five years, with a population of 15 million expected by 2051.
That growth will naturally increase demand for major infrastructure such as transit systems, highways, roads and bridge networks, water and wastewater and housing—some of which is already being addressed through the construction of the four major subway projects in the Greater Toronto Area. It will also require developments such as significant highway expansion to facilitate trade corridors; continuing with the current and future transit expansion projects; dedicating funds to address aging water and wastewater systems and streamlining the current slow and uncertain development and building approvals process in the GTA.
“We commend the federal government for initiating Canada’s first-ever national assessment and applaud the forward-thinking it entails,” says executive director Nadia Todorova. “As the government embarks on this sort of long-term planning, one thing must be kept top of mind: investing in capital projects is one of the best ways to create jobs and help our economy recover from the devastating effects of the pandemic and flourish thereafter.”
The group has also called for the federal government to take an increasingly lighter touch in the process by which local projects are approved for funding. It recommends the federal government establish broad governing criteria for how funding should be used, and then rely on the provinces to be the arbiters of project selection. Doing so, RCCAO says, would ensure that projects are staged in a manner that best meets the municipality’s demands for efficient growth and would reduce or eliminate the lag-time experienced in past federal programs which entailed an application process.
RCCAO is also clear that funding should be allocated not just to the mega-projects that catch headlines, but also those state-of-good repair projects that are essential for municipalities—and contractors.
The submission highlights the scope of the infrastructure deficit across the county and in Ontario in particular. RCCAO estimates that the national infrastructure shortfall is between $110 and $270 billion. Ontario’s share of that is $60 billion. That fact, says RCCAO, is proof that despite governments’ recent commitments to record infrastructure funding, significant investments are still needed.
“We need to continue with current and future transit development projects, expanding our highways, dedicating funds to address aging water and wastewater systems, and streamlining the development and building approvals process in the GTA,” says Todorova.
The good news is, such investments tend to have positive multiplier effects. The RCCAO submission cites that every dollar spent on infrastructure construction generates $1.46 in gross domestic product.
Finally, the submission notes there needs to be a greatly expanded use of electronic permitting in the planning, engineering and building permitting areas of infrastructure development. Doing so, it says, would enable municipal, regional and provincial authorities and external agencies to work on a common platform.
“Governments should work to foster innovative methods of doing business and leverage the expertise and knowledge of the infrastructure and construction industry as part of these efforts,” says Todorova. “We need to make sure that governments, industry and stakeholders are working together to make the necessary infrastructure investments needed to keep Ontario and Canada competitive.”
Featured image: Sewer pipe installation (File photo)