North Vancouver mayor calls for rapid-transit tunnel linking North Shore to Vancouver

One North Shore mayor says it’s time to take a serious look at building a rapid-transit tunnel underneath Burrard Inlet.

Traffic gridlock is a common sight on the North Shore. A $130-million upgrade to the Upper Levels Highway was recently announced, but the City of North Vancouver’s Darrell Mussatto thinks more drastic measures are in order. He is proposing a third crossing between the North Shore and Vancouver.

“We’ve seen a lot of gridlock on the North Shore here,” he said. “So why not consider a better link between the waterfront in Vancouver and the Lonsdale Quay?” he said.

North Vancouver has approached TransLink about looking into a three-kilometre SkyTrain tunnel under Burrard Inlet.

“You could have a train leaving every three or four minutes as opposed to every 15 minutes right now,” Mussatto said. “And it might be something that could really encourage people to get out of their automobile and instead of driving over one of the two bridges, taking a SkyTrain link.”

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The deepest part along the current SeaBus route, which currently transports commuters across the Burrard Inlet, is about 70 metres deep. However, according to tunnel expert Dean Brox, today’s technology could make a tunnel feasible.

“Tunneling methods have become (so) innovative today that they are able to build very sophisticated and more challenging tunnels,” Brox said.

“The Canada Line that was completed back in 2010 for the Olympics, passes under False Creek for a distance of just less than a kilomtere and that was successfully constructed as everyone knows.”

In addition, construction costs could be offset somewhat by money saved in wages, fuel and maintenance to the SeaBus.

“In terms of timeline, this is something that is quite longer-term – maybe eight to 10 years out – but we need to start having those discussions now and doing the investigations now to see really what can we work into the budget,” Mussatto said.

– With files from Ted Chernecki