WINNIPEG – A city councillor is blasting city staff for not doing enough to advertise an upcoming open house on final plans for the next leg of rapid transit.
“It’s very frustrating and as a new councillor it’s driving me crazy,” St. Norbert Councillor Janice Lukes said Tuesday. “It doesn’t matter what we do if we can’t communicate it out what we’re doing, you know, we have to have a better communications system.”
The public will get a chance to see the final designs for the almost-$600 million dollar project extending the Southwest Transitway from Jubilee Ave. to the University of Manitoba at an open house Thursday from 3:30 to 9:30 p.m. at the CanadInns at 1824 Pembina Highway.
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The city has promoted the open house in newspaper ads and on its website but Lukes says more must be done to reach out to residents, including alerting the media. Lukes was also unhappy that councillors have yet to be briefed on the transit plan.
“This is huge. We are spending a million dollars on transit right now getting people in and out of the stadium it’s really important to see how it connects to the stadium and how it connects to the U of M which is the 2nd most commuted to destination in the city of Winnipeg.”
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The open house will be the public’s first chance to see final details on how the 7.6 km extension of the bus route will make its way into the University of Manitoba and to Investors Group Field. The plans include a new transit station at the north end of the stadium – making it much easier for football fans and concert-goers to travel by bus.
Winnipeg Transit director Dave Wardrop described the route Tuesday at city hall.
“The expected routing is for a branch line to come off the Southwest Rapid Transitway in and around Southpark drive which will then cross Pembina Highway through the Southwood golf course and then connect up to the north side of the of Investors Group stadium with transit traffic then joining mixed traffic on University Crescent and looping through the university much as it does now,” Wardrop said.
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