Burnaby residents could face higher property taxes, more crowded SkyTrain cars and the cancellation of long-awaited local transit projects if regional transit plans are upended.
That’s the conclusion City of Burnaby staff came to in a report analyzing the potential impacts of scrapping planned Light Rapid Transit (LRT) in Surrey in favour of a SkyTrain line along Fraser Highway.
The region’s Mayors’ Council endorsed the new plan in November after Surrey Mayor Doug McCallum was elected, in part, on a promise to upend regional transit planning in favour of Skytrain over LRT south of the Fraser.
TransLink had planned for two LRT lines: an “L” shaped route connecting Surrey Centre, Newton and Guildford (SNG) and a straight route along Fraser Highway to Langley. Senior levels of government have already committed to funding the $1.6 billion SNG line, while the $1.9 billion Langley line remains unfunded.
The next step in advancing the Surrey/Langley SkyTrain plans will come before the Mayors’ Council on Thursday but many questions remain unanswered.
“The implications for Burnaby will become clearer once the direction of the Mayors’ Council is known,” wrote Lou Pelletier, Burnaby’s director of planning and building.
If a Fraser Highway SkyTrain is built and existing SNG LRT plans go ahead, it would cost an extra $1 billion to build and $7.3 million per year to operate.
“This has implications for all residents of the region,” Pelletier wrote.
Assuming TransLink ends up paying its traditional 30 per cent share, this plan would cost an additional $510 million over 30 years.
Burnaby taxes could rise
“If this cost was apportioned across the region, based on population, the cost to Burnaby residents would be about $48 million,” Pelletier wrote. “This works out to an average annual payment of about $10 per person.”
These figures, however, are based on many assumptions and “should be considered as extremely rough approximations,” Pelletier wrote.
And the Mayors’ Council might end up forcing Surrey to pay for the new plans on its own, which could cost the average Surrey resident an additional $40 a year, according to Pelletier.
According to the report, TransLink would likely be forced to raise property taxes because its other revenue streams – transit fares and a fuel tax – are harder to increase due to market and legislative constraints. Taxpayers might incorrectly blame their municipality for the increased taxes and put pressure on their council to lower local taxes to compensate, Pelletier wrote.
More crowded trains likely
He also wrote that a Fraser Highway SkyTrain would lead to more people travelling from Surrey to Vancouver, rather than taking shorter trips within Surrey on an LRT.
“This would increase passenger loads on the Expo Line through Burnaby,” Pelletier wrote.
Burnaby projects may be delayed
And, the report says, proposed new projects in Burnaby – such as a Burnaby Mountain gondola to SFU and a new connection between Metrotown and Brentwood Town Centre – could be “cancelled or deferred” due to the cost of SkyTrain construction in Surrey.
A SkyTrain line to Langley is popular but likely unnecessary, and building it could set an expensive precedent “encouraging the construction of expensive SkyTrain lines in other corridors where it is not justified by projected ridership,” Pelletier wrote.
“This will increase total system cost in the long term or, alternatively, reduce the number of corridors that can be served.”
