No timeline for Tim Houston’s election promise to remove Halifax bridge tolls

Drivers who use either of the two bridges that span Halifax Harbour may be wondering when tolls will be eliminated, as promised by the newly re-elected Nova Scotia premier.

Speaking with reporters Tuesday after MLAs were sworn-in, Tim Houston said he didn’t really have a timeline for the tolls.

“It’s probably a budget thing,” he told reporters Tuesday, while speaking on a range of topics.

During the election campaign, Houston promised if his PC party was re-elected to a second term, it would remove the tolls on the MacKay and Macdonald bridges “by April 1.”

Tolls on both bridges, which are operated by a Crown corporation called Halifax Harbour Bridges, range from $1 for those with passes to $1.25 for drivers who pay cash at the toll plazas.

Houston said at the time the promise would cost about $40 million a year, but should alleviate traffic congestion and save time for drivers.

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“I would prefer to think of that as both a $40-million tax cut for Nova Scotia drivers and a $40-million investment in reducing traffic time and giving more time back to you (drivers),” he said Oct. 29.

It’s estimated 110,000 vehicles cross the two bridges daily.

On Tuesday, Houston said there are details that still needed to be worked on for tolls to be removed — and that he didn’t believe there were any infrastructure changes needed for his election promise to come to fruition.

“Obviously there’s people that work there. And in fact, of the tolls that were collected, you know, a portion of that goes to overhead for sure. So there’s people that work there. So we’re conscious of that,” he said.

“I think the tolls can be removed without taking out all the infrastructure. I don’t think that that will cause that to be a delay. But I think we just work through it and it’ll be a budget item.”

A spokesperson from Halifax Harbour Bridges told Global News there was no update to share on the issue of tolls, and that they didn’t expect any new information about the subject until the new year.

— with a file from The Canadian Press