August 31, 2021, at 12:00 PM

Original link

1.   Disclosures of Pecuniary Interest

Councillor J. Morgan discloses a pecuniary interest with respect to Item 2.15, having to do with the Participation in the South London Air Monitoring Network Pilot Project by indicating that part of the funding for this project will go to Western University, which is his employer.

2.   Consent

Moved by M. Cassidy

Seconded by S. Turner

That Items 2.1, 2.2, 2.3, 2.4, 2.5, 2.6, 2.7, 2.8, 2.9, 2.10, 2.11, 2.12, 2.13, 2.16, 2.17, and 2.18 BE APPROVED.

Motion Passed (6 to 0)

2.1   6th Report of the Cycling Advisory Committee

2021-07-21 CAC Report

Moved by M. Cassidy

Seconded by S. Turner

That the 6th Report of the Cycling Advisory Committee, from its meeting held on July 21, 2021, BE RECEIVED.

Motion Passed

2.2   Appointment of Consulting Engineer for the Hyde Park EA SWM Works - Assignment ‘A’ Detailed Design

2021-08-31 SR - Hyde Park EA SWM Works Assignment A - Full

Moved by M. Cassidy

Seconded by S. Turner

That, on the recommendation of the Deputy City Manager, Environment and Infrastructure, the following actions be taken with respect to the staff report dated August 31, 2021, related to the appointment of consulting services for the Hyde Park EA SWM Works – Assignment ‘A’ project:

a)        Stantec Consulting Inc. BE APPOINTED consulting engineers to complete the detailed design for the Hyde Park EA SWM Works – Assignment ‘A’ project in accordance with the estimate, on file, at an upset amount of $301,032.57 (including contingency, provisional items and allowances), excluding HST, in accordance with Section 15.2(e) of the City of London’s Procurement of Goods and Services Policy;

b)        the financing for this project BE APPROVED as set out in the Sources of Financing Report as appended to the above-noted staff report;

c)        Civic Administration BE AUTHORIZED to undertake all the administrative acts that are necessary in connection with this project;

d)        the approval given, herein, BE CONDITIONAL upon the Corporation entering into a formal contract; and

e)        the Mayor and the City Clerk BE AUTHORIZED to execute any contract or other documents, if required, to give effect to these recommendations. (2021-E09)

Motion Passed

2.3   Contract Award: Tender Award RFT 21-88 - Tender Award for Dingman Creek Southwinds (Tributary 12)  Natural Channel Reconstruction and Flood Mitigation

2021-08-31 SR - Dingman Creek Southwinds Channel Reconstruction - Full

Moved by M. Cassidy

Seconded by S. Turner

That, on the recommendation of the Deputy City Manager, Environment and Infrastructure, the following actions be taken with respect to the staff report dated August 31, 2021, related to the award of contract for the Dingman Creek Southwinds Channel (Tributary 12) Reconstruction and Multiuse Pathway:

a)        the bid submitted by J-AAR Excavating Limited at its tendered price of, $4,069,026.25 (including 10% contingency), excluding HST, for the Dingman Creek Southwinds Channel (Tributary 12) Reconstruction and Multiuse Pathway Project, BE ACCEPTED; it being noted that the bid submitted by J-AAR Excavating Limited was the lowest of two bids received and meets the City’s specifications and requirements in all areas;

b)        Ecosystem Recovery Inc. BE APPROVED for additional construction administration fee of $74,046.50 (including 10% contingency), excluding HST, in accordance with Section 15.2(g) of the City of London’s Procurement of Goods and Services Policy;

c)         the financing for this project BE APPROVED as set out in the Sources of Financing Report as appended to the above-noted staff report;

d)         Civic Administration INITIATE a Zoning By-law amendment following the completion of this project to update the limits of the Open Space (OS) Zones to reflect the limits of the Regulatory Floodplain Limits as identified in as-built construction drawings;

e)         the approval given, herein, BE CONDITIONAL upon the Corporation entering into a formal contract, or issuing a purchase order for the material to be supplied and the work to be done, relating to this project (Tender RFT21-88); and,

f)          the Mayor and the City Clerk BE AUTHORIZED to execute any contract or other documents, if required, to give effect to these recommendations. (2021-E05/E21)

Motion Passed

2.4   Appointment of Consulting Engineer for Wastewater Treatment Plant Condition Assessment and Asset Valuation

2021-08-31 SR - WWTP Condition Assessment Consultant Award - Full

Moved by M. Cassidy

Seconded by S. Turner

That, on the recommendation of the Deputy City Manager, Environment and Infrastructure, the following actions be taken with respect to the staff report dated August 31, 2021, related to the Appointment of Consulting Engineer for the Condition Assessment and Asset Valuation of the City’s Wastewater Treatment Plants:

a)        AECOM Canada Ltd. BE APPOINTED Consulting Engineers to complete the condition assessment, asset valuation and capital renewal forecasting assignment for the City’s wastewater treatment plants, in the total amount of $291,163.00 (including contingency), excluding HST;

b)        the financing for this project BE APPROVED as set out in the Sources of Financing Report as appended to the above-noted staff report;

c)        Civic Administration BE AUTHORIZED to undertake all the administrative acts that are necessary in connection with this work;

d)        the approval given, herein, BE CONDITIONAL upon the Corporation entering into a formal contract with the consultant for the project; and,

e)        the Mayor and the City Clerk BE AUTHORIZED to execute any contract or other documents, if required, to give effect to these recommendations. (2021-E03)

Motion Passed

2.5   Appointment of Consulting Engineers - Stormwater Management Facility Build-out Sediment Survey

2021-08-31 SR - SWMF Build-out Sediment Survey - Full

Moved by M. Cassidy

Seconded by S. Turner

That, on the recommendation of the Deputy City Manager, Environment and Infrastructure, the following actions be taken with respect to the staff report dated August 31, 2021, related to the Appointment of Consulting Engineers for the Stormwater Management Facility Build-out Sediment Survey project:

a)        Ecosystem Recovery Inc. BE APPOINTED Consulting Engineers to complete the Stormwater Management Facility Build-out Sediment Survey project, in the total amount of $273,600.00 (including contingency), excluding HST;

b)        the financing for this project BE APPROVED as set out in the Sources of Financing Report as appended to the above-noted staff report;

c)        Civic Administration BE AUTHORIZED to undertake all the administrative acts that are necessary in connection with this work;

d)        the approval given, herein, BE CONDITIONAL upon the Corporation entering into a formal contract with the consultant for the project; and,

e)        the Mayor and the City Clerk BE AUTHORIZED to execute any contract or other documents, if required, to give effect to these recommendations. (2021-E03)

Motion Passed

2.6   Delegation of Authority to Approve Work at the Westminster Wastewater Treatment Plant

2021-08-31 SR - Westminster WWTP Authority Delegation - Full

Moved by M. Cassidy

Seconded by S. Turner

That, on the recommendation of the Deputy City Manager, Environment and Infrastructure, the proposed by-law as appended to the staff report dated August 31, 2021, BE INTRODUCED at the Municipal Council meeting to be held on September 14, 2021, to amend By-law No. A.-7895-270 being “A by-law to authorize an Amending Agreement between The Corporation of the City of London and Trojan Technologies and to authorize the Mayor and City Clerk to execute the Agreement” to delegate the function of approving future site improvements and construction by Trojan Technologies to the Deputy City Manager, Environment and Infrastructure, or her delegate. (2021-E03)

Motion Passed

2.7   Appointment of Consulting Engineers - Culvert Inventory and Condition Assessment (RFP21-52) - Irregular Result

2021-08-31 SR - Culvert Inventory Condition Assessment - Full

Moved by M. Cassidy

Seconded by S. Turner

That, on the recommendation of the Deputy City Manager, Environment and Infrastructure, the following actions be taken with respect to the staff report dated August 31, 2021, related to the Appointment of Consulting Engineer for the Culvert Inventory and Condition Assessment project:

a)        Stantec Consulting Ltd. BE APPOINTED Consulting Engineers to complete the Culvert Inventory and Condition Assessment, in the total amount of $119,532.48 (including contingency), excluding HST, in accordance with Section 19.4(c) of the City of London’s Procurement of Goods and Services Policy;

b)        the financing for this project BE APPROVED as set out in the Sources of Financing Report as appended to the above-noted staff report;

c)        Civic Administration BE AUTHORIZED to undertake all the administrative acts that are necessary in connection with this work;

d)        the approval given, herein, BE CONDITIONAL upon the Corporation entering into a formal contract with the consultant for the project; and,

e)        the Mayor and the City Clerk BE AUTHORIZED to execute any contract or other documents, if required, to give effect to these recommendations. (2021-T06)

Motion Passed

2.8   Increase Contract Award: West London Dyke Reapplication of Anti-Graffiti Coating to Phases 1 and 2

2021-08-31 SR - West London Dyke - Anti-Graffiti Coating - Full

Moved by M. Cassidy

Seconded by S. Turner

That, on the recommendation of the Deputy City Manager, Environment and Infrastructure, the following actions be taken with respect to the staff report dated August 31, 2021, related to increasing the existing contract for Phase 7 West London Dyke project:

a)        the Upper Thames River Conservation Authority BE AUTHORIZED to carry out added works for Phase 7 of the West London Dyke reconstruction by increasing the City’s cost share by $219,114.38 (including contingency), excluding HST;

b)        the financing for this project BE APPROVED as set out in the Sources of Financing Report as appended to the above-noted staff report;

c)        Civic Administration BE AUTHORIZED to undertake all the administrative acts that are necessary in connection with this work;

d)        the approval given, herein, BE CONDITIONAL upon the Corporation entering into a formal contract with the consultant for the project; and,

e)        the Mayor and the City Clerk BE AUTHORIZED to execute any contract or other documents, if required, to give effect to these recommendations. (2021-E01)

Motion Passed

2.9   Appointment of Consulting Engineers - McNay Drain Rehabilitation and Construction Administration

2021-08-31 SR - McNay Drain Consultant Assignment - Full

Moved by M. Cassidy

Seconded by S. Turner

That, on the recommendation of the Deputy City Manager, Environment and Infrastructure, the following actions be taken with respect to the staff report dated August 31, 2021, related to the Appointment of Consulting Engineers for the McNay Drain Rehabilitation and Contract Administration project:

a)        Ecosystem Recovery Inc. BE APPOINTED Consulting Engineers to complete the McNay Drain Rehabilitation and Contract Administration, in the total amount of $387,485.00 (including contingency), excluding HST;

b)        the financing for this project BE APPROVED as set out in the Sources of Financing Report as appended to the above-noted staff report;

c)        Civic Administration BE AUTHORIZED to undertake all the administrative acts that are necessary in connection with this work;

d)        the approval given, herein, BE CONDITIONAL upon the Corporation entering into a formal contract with the consultant for the project; and,

e)        the Mayor and the City Clerk BE AUTHORIZED to execute any contract or other documents, if required, to give effect to these recommendations. (2021-E09)

Motion Passed

2.10   Amendments to the Traffic and Parking By-law

2021-08-31 SR - Traffic and Parking By-law Amendment

Moved by M. Cassidy

Seconded by S. Turner

That, on the recommendation of the Deputy City Manager, Environment and Infrastructure, the proposed by-law as appended to the staff report dated August 31, 2021, BE INTRODUCED at the Municipal Council meeting to be held on September 14, 2021, to amend By-law PS-113 entitled, “A by-law to regulate traffic and the parking of motor vehicles in the City of London”. (2021-T02/T08)

Motion Passed

2.11   2020 Corporate Energy Consumption and Activities Report

2021-08-31 SR - 2020 Corporate Energy Consumption - Full

Moved by M. Cassidy

Seconded by S. Turner

That, on the recommendation of the Deputy City Manager, Environment and Infrastructure, the following actions be taken with respect to the staff report dated August 31, 2021, related to the 2020 Corporate Energy Consumption and Activities Report:

a)        the above-noted staff report BE RECEIVED for information; and,

b)        the above-noted staff report BE CIRCULATED to the Advisory Committee on the Environment (ACE) for their information. (2021-E17)

Motion Passed

2.12   2020 Community Energy Use and Greenhouse Gas Inventory Emissions Inventory

2021-08-31 SR - 2020 Community Energy GHG Inventory - Full

Moved by M. Cassidy

Seconded by S. Turner

That, on the recommendation of the Deputy City Manager, Environment and Infrastructure, the following actions be taken with respect to the staff report dated August 31, 2021, related to the 2020 Community Energy Use and Greenhouse Gas Emissions Inventory:

a)        the above-noted staff report BE RECEIVED for information; and,

b)        the above-noted staff report BE CIRCULATED to the Advisory Committee on the Environment (ACE), Transportation Advisory Committee (TAC), Cycling Advisory Committee (CAC), Trees and Forestry Advisory Committee (TFAC), Agricultural Advisory Committee (AAG), and Environmental and Ecological Planning Advisory Committee (EEPAC) for their information. (2021-E17)

Motion Passed

2.13   Outcome of Climate Lens Process Applied to Waste Management Programs and Projects

2021-08-31 SR - Climate Lens - Waste Management

Moved by M. Cassidy

Seconded by S. Turner

That, on the recommendation of the Deputy City Manager, Environment and Infrastructure, the staff report dated August 31, 2021, related to how the Climate Lens Process has been applied to a broad range of plans, programs and projects in Waste Management, BE RECEIVED for information. (2021-E07)

Motion Passed

2.16   Single Source Additional Forestry Stump Cutter

2021-08-31 SR - Additional Forestry Stump Cutter - Full

Moved by M. Cassidy

Seconded by S. Turner

That, on the recommendation of the Deputy City Manager, Finance Supports, the following actions be taken with respect to the staff report dated August 31, 2021, related to the purchase of a Tow-Behind Forestry Stump Cutter:

a)        the Single Source negotiated price BE ACCEPTED to purchase one (1) 2021 Vermeer SC802 Stump Cutter for a total estimated price of $88,000.00, excluding HST, from Vermeer Canada Inc. 4191 Perkins Road, London, Ontario N6L1C2;

b)        the financing for this purchase BE APPROVED in accordance with the Source of Financing Report as appended the above-noted staff report;

c)        Civic Administration BE AUTHORIZED to undertake all the administrative acts that are necessary in connection with this purchase; and,

d)        the approval given, herein, BE CONDITIONAL upon the Corporation entering into a formal contract or having a purchase order, or contract record relating to the subject matter of this approval. (2021-V02)

Motion Passed

2.17   RFP 21-37 Supply and Delivery of CNG Split Steam Rear Loading Waste Collection Trucks

2021-08-31 SR - RFP21-37 CNG Split Stream Rear Loading Trucks - Full

Moved by M. Cassidy

Seconded by S. Turner

That, on the recommendation of the Deputy City Manager, Finance Supports, the following actions be taken with respect to the staff report dated August 31, 2021, related to the supply and delivery of Compressed Natural Gas (CNG) Split Stream Rear Loading Waste Collection Trucks:

a)        the submission from London Machinery Inc. (LMI) 15790 Robin’s Hill Road, London, Ontario N5V0A4 for a total purchase price of $10,755,520.00 excluding HST, BE ACCEPTED;

b)        the financing for this purchase BE APPROVED as set out in the Source of Financing Report as appended to the above-noted staff report;

c)        Civic Administration BE AUTHORIZED to undertake all the administrative acts that are necessary in connection with this purchase; and,

d)        the approval given, herein, BE CONDITIONAL upon the Corporation entering into a formal contract, purchase order, or contract record relating to the subject matter of this approval. (2021-V01)

Motion Passed

2.18   COVID-19 Resilience Infrastructure Stream - Local Government Intake - Transfer Payment Agreement

2021-08-31 SR - COVID-19 Resilience Infrastructure - TPA - Full

Moved by M. Cassidy

Seconded by S. Turner

That, on the recommendation of the Deputy City Manager, Finance Supports, the proposed by-law as appended to the staff report dated August 31, 2021, BE INTRODUCED at the Municipal Council meeting to be held on September 14, 2021, to approve the Transfer Payment Agreement for Investing in Canada Infrastructure Program (ICIP): COVID-19 Resilience Infrastructure Team - Local Government Intake Stream Projects between Her Majesty the Queen in right of Ontario as represented by the Minister of Infrastructure for the Province of Ontario and The Corporation of the City of London (“Agreement”) and authorize the Mayor and the City Clerk to execute the Agreement and any future amending agreements. (2021-S08/F11)

Motion Passed

2.14   Outcome of Climate Lens Screening Applied to Major Transportation Projects

2021-08-31 SR - Climate Lens - Major Transportation Projects

Moved by J. Helmer

Seconded by M. Cassidy

That, on the recommendation of the Deputy City Manager, Environment and Infrastructure, the following actions be taken with respect to the staff report dated August 31, 2021, related to the initial Climate Emergency screening of current major transportation projects:

a)        Civic Administration BE DIRECTED to implement the project specific recommendations contained in the above-noted staff report that includes:

i)         proceeding with the implementation of a number of transportation projects with consideration of the outcomes of the review as identified in the report; 

ii)        suspending the Discover Wonderland Environmental Assessment noting that the role and function of this corridor will be considered as part of the future Mobility Master Plan;

iii)       suspending the corridor widening on Adelaide Street North noting that the Environmental Assessment for the Adelaide Street North should be finalized to inform complete streets intersection improvements at Sunningdale Road planned for 2025 and the remainder of the corridor improvements will be subject to further assessment under the future Mobility Master Plan;

b)        subject to Municipal Council approval of the above-noted recommendation, Civic Administration BE DIRECTED to adjust the Multi-Year Budget during the next appropriate update cycle; and,

c)        Civic Administration BE DIRECTED to review ongoing transportation projects to consider climate change mitigation and adaptation to ensure resiliency of critical transportation infrastructure;

it being noted that the communication from R. Henkel, with respect to this matter, was received. (2021-T05/E05)

Motion Passed (5 to 1)

2.15   Participation in the South London Air Monitoring Network Pilot Project - RESUBMITTED

2021-08-31 SR - South London Air Monitoring Network - Full

Moved by S. Turner

Seconded by M. Cassidy

That, on the recommendation of the Deputy City Manager, Environment and Infrastructure, the following actions be taken with respect to the staff report dated August 31, 2021, related to the South London Air Monitoring Network Pilot Project:

a)        the above-noted staff report BE RECEIVED for information;

b)        the proposed by-law as appended to the above-noted staff report BE INTRODUCED at the Municipal Council meeting to be held on September 14, 2021, to authorize and approve an Agreement between Envirosuite Canada Inc. and The Corporation of the City of London and to authorize the Mayor and the City Clerk to execute the Agreement;

c)        the single source negotiated price BE ACCEPTED to hire Envirosuite Limited for a term of three years for a total estimated price of $303,990.00, excluding HST;

d)        the financing for the project BE APPROVED in accordance with the Source of Financing Report as appended to the above-noted staff report;

e)        Civic Administration BE AUTHORIZED to undertake all the administrative acts that are necessary in connection with this purchase;

f)         the approval given, herein, BE CONDITIONAL upon the Corporation entering into a formal contract or having a purchase order, or contract record relating to the subject matter of this approval; and,

g)        Civic Administration BE AUTHORIZED to work with Western University (Western Engineering) on the South London Air Monitoring Network Pilot Project including a specific focus on the W12A Landfill with approved funds in 2021 and base program funds in 2022 (Program 480201.355000) in the amount of $40,000 per year for two years; noting that City of London funds will be used by Western University to secure additional research funding through Mitacs and similar academic funding agencies. (2021-E05)

Motion Passed (5 to 0)

3.   Scheduled Items

None.

4.   Items for Direction

4.1   7th Report of the Transportation Advisory Committee

2021-08-03 TAC Report

Moved by S. Turner

Seconded by M. Cassidy

That the following actions be taken with respect to the 7th Report of the Transportation Advisory Committee, from its meeting held on August 3, 2021:

a)        the following actions be taken with respect the Transportation Advisory Committee (TAC) Evolution and Recommendation document from D. Foster:

i)         the City Clerk BE ADVISED that the TAC has completed its evolution into a model Advisory Committee and should, therefore, maintain its current Terms of Reference make up and “at large” pilot; and,

ii)        the City Clerk BE ADVISED that the progress of the TAC should be evaluated concurrently with the proposed, but as yet untested, Community Engagement Panel pilot concept; and,

b)        clauses 1.1, 2.1, 3.1, 3.3, 3.4, and 5.1 BE RECEIVED.

Motion Passed (6 to 0)

4.2   Commercial E-scooters in the City of London 

2021-08-31 PS - CNIB Position on E-Scooters - R. Gaunt (Redacted)

Moved by S. Turner

Seconded by M. Cassidy

That the following actions be taken with respect to Commercial E-scooters in the City of London:

a)        the communications from the following individuals with respect to this matter BE RECEIVED:

  • R. Gaunt;

  • S. Besseau;

  • C. Schafer;

  • S. Elford; and,

  • D. Lepofsky;

b)        the above-noted communications and comments from delegations heard by the Civic Works Committee BE FORWARDED to Civic Administration for consideration. (2021-S12)

Motion Passed (5 to 0)

Voting Record:

Moved by S. Turner

Seconded by M. Cassidy

That the request for delegation status from the following individuals BE APPROVED:

  • S. Besseau;

  • C. Schafer; and,

  • D. Lepofsky.

Motion Passed (6 to 0)

5.   Deferred Matters/Additional Business

5.1   Deferred Matters List

CWC DEFERRED MATTERS as at August 23, 2021

Moved by M. Cassidy

Seconded by S. Turner

That the Civic Works Committee Deferred Matters List as at August 23, 2021, BE RECEIVED.

Motion Passed (5 to 0)

5.2   (ADDED) 7th Report of the Cycling Advisory Committee

2021-08-18 CAC Report

Moved by M. Cassidy

Seconded by S. Turner

That the following actions be taken with respect to the 7th Report of the Cycling Advisory Committee, from its meeting held on August 18, 2021:

a)        a Sub-Committee BE ESTABLISHED to prepare comments and feedback with respect to the Dundas Place Traffic Diversion and report back to the Cycling Advisory Committee at their next meeting;

b)        Municipal Council and Civic Administration BE ADVISED that the Cycling Advisory Committee (CAC) supports the petition calling for the creation of bike lock-up facilities in the City of London and that the CAC is appreciative of the bike locker pilot project that is being launched in the City of London; and,

c)         clauses 1.1, 2.1, 3.1, and 3.3 BE RECEIVED.

Motion Passed (5 to 0)

6.   Adjournment

The meeting adjourned at 2:12 PM.

Full Transcript

Transcript provided by Lillian Skinner’s London Council Archive. Note: This is an automated speech-to-text transcript and may contain errors. Speaker names are not identified.

View full transcript (2 hours, 25 minutes)

Good afternoon, everyone. This is the 11th meeting of the Civic Works Committee held here under the COVID pandemic at City Hall. City Hall is open to the public, but in limited capacity. The city of London is committed to making every effort to provide alternate formats and communication supports for council, standing or advisory committee meetings and information upon request.

To make a request for any city’s service, please contact accessibility@london.ca or 519-661-2489 extension 2425. To make a request specific to this meeting, please contact CWC@london.ca. For the members of committee and the public, we do have all committee members present and Deputy Mayor Josh Morgan is acting mayor and is here joining us committee today on behalf of Mayor Holder. I will now look to committee for disclosures of the culinary interest.

Deputy Mayor Morgan. Yes, thank you, Chair. On item 2.15, which is the resubmitted south London air monitoring network pilot project. Part of the project flows money to my employer, Western University.

So I would declare a pecuniary interest on that. Perfect, thank you. Looking to committee for any other disclosures of pecuniary interest. Seeing none, I will move on to looking to see what consent item is committee would like pulled separate.

And certainly with the conflict, 2.15 will be called, looking to see if there’s anything else within the consent items of all 18 items, if there’s anything we’d like to deal with separate. So, Mayor Morgan. Thank you, Chair. I’d like to pull 2.14, please.

Noted. We currently have 2.14 and 2.15 to be discussed separate. Looking to committee to see if there’s anything else. Seeing none for committee today, I will note that there are some things on our agenda than the added agenda.

So just make sure you’re going off the most recent agenda. And in regards to two points, sorry, just working through some Turkey-type things. With us today, we have Ms. Share, who as on our agenda, we have some corporate energy use and new things we haven’t seen before.

Kelly is providing us with an update to start. That’s going to form some of our information and knowledge going forward into some other items. So Ms. Share, if you would like to move forward with the items that you have to give us information on, you have your five minutes.

Thank you very much, Madam. Today, you have before you, the first of four reports related to the climate emergency declaration declared by Council in 2019. The first two reports, which remain in consent, should be very familiar to members of this committee. They deal with our annual reports related to energy use, greenhouse gas emissions and climate change.

The first one covers the actions of the corporation and the second the actions of the community. Both are continuing to highlight positive progress. However, it is important to note that the data in 2020 is significantly influenced by the pandemic and its impacts on office work, travel and transportation patterns within the city. And we don’t, like many other cities around the world, know what those long-term impacts will be as people return to a post-COVID life.

These reports involve a lot of input from staff throughout the corporation, as well as energy stakeholders in the community. And it’s foundational to the climate emergency action plan, which you will be seeing elsewhere later this fall. It also provides a good representation of how we intend to report out on future issues related to our progress and our successes as well. There are two other reports that represent the first applications of a climate lens process, which was part of the direction from Council in 2019.

We have developed a process versus a single lens, which we talked about a bit back in April and we provided an update. And the reason is the process is to provide the flexibility to evaluate distinct programs throughout the corporation and from a climate change perspective. 2.13, which remained in consent as well, is a screening tool applied to the waste management area. And it looks to demonstrate a review of all five activities streams and lay out the climate change requirements from a priority perspective for the next three years.

We’ll be doing very similar processes like this throughout the organization. Many are underway and a few are waiting on the resources to be available in other service areas as they work through their pandemic staffing impacts. 2.14, which I will discuss in more details that have been removed from the consent agenda, reflects the direction from Council at the time that climate emergency was declared for staff to review all transportation capital projects from a climate change perspective. This is an important direction.

As everybody knows, personal transportation choices are the largest contributor of greenhouse gases in London and in pretty well every community that have a transportation system largely reliant on passenger vehicles. So this review is a screening tool to identify the direct and indirect impacts of current transportation infrastructure project. The results of that work reaffirm the commitment to a complete streets approach as being appropriate. So you’ll see in that report that many roadway projects are continued, recommended for continuation in order to ensure that we provide a complete street cross section.

That is one that it enables to the accommodation of transit, walking, cycling and driving. A complete streets approach is also very beneficial from supporting growth, from emergency services provision, from a stormwater management perspective and from a road safety perspective. The report does recommend the projects where the primary benefit is temporary congestion relief for single passenger vehicles that those projects do not proceed. The cycle of road widening to solely improve the travel time for single passenger vehicle tends to invite more travel.

It’s called induced demand. And very often the return of congestion occurs quite quickly after the widening projects are done. So while roadway widening to temporarily alleviate congestion does not contribute to our strategic plan goals of mitigating climate change, improving affordability and making the city more livable and healthy for everyone, we do need to consider how these corridors operate in the future. And we are recommending that that review occurs part of the mobility master plan.

There are changes within these corridors that can improve the way travel works on those corridors. These are things like access management, transit queue jump lanes, transportation demand management and traffic signal timing adjustments. Coping for the mobility master plan is currently underway and we will be coming back to this committee this fall to outline the work plan, the consultation points and the scope of work that it will include. It is a multi-year comprehensive citywide multimodal process and there will be plenty of opportunity for both elected officials, stakeholders in the community and individual Londoners to be involved.

So these will be reviewed through that process to see how we can manage them better. Staff from our teams are available to answer any questions you may have on any of our reports of course and particularly on the ones that we’ve removed for further discussion. Thank you. Thank you for that as some of these are annual reports and now their foundation reports based on council direction as we move forward.

So a reminder to committee 2.14 and 2.15 will be dealt with separate. So looking to committee to start a speakers list on anything else on the consent items that have not been fooled in which you would like questions or comments or any clarification from staff on. I will start my speakers list and recognize councilor Cassidy. Thank you, Madam Chair, a quick question on 2.6, the delegation of authority to approve work at the Westminster wastewater treatment plant.

Just wondering if that’s a leasing arrangement with Trojan technologies or are they just borrowing the site from us and wondering if part of their research, does any of that flow back to the city? Is there a benefit to the city for the research that’s taking place there? To Mr. Mathers, please.

Through the chair, we do have an agreement with Trojan to be able to use this site. What we get in in mind is a reduction in some of the costs that we have as far as buying equipment from Trojan. We do own some of their equipment and we have our savings that we realize from being able to allow them to use this space. The main benefit is that this is just allowing for an innovative use of an existing city facility that isn’t being used and try to promote innovation throughout the city and be able to allow a local corporation to be able to use this site and do research.

So I would say that there is a benefit to the city in that we’re promoting economic development as far as research into wastewater field. And the most part what they’re looking at doing is to actually modernize the site and to construct a building over some of the concrete tanks to be able to use them more effectively for research. So it’s not extremely extensive work that they’re doing but we wanted to be able to come back to council and ensure that the staff can review this work that they’re doing and also approve it on council’s behalf. Councilor Cassidy?

Thank you for that, that’s a great answer. Thank you. I also have a quick question on 2.11. The corporate energy consumption and activities report.

So recognizing that we have a goal that we have to meet and seeing some progress made, recognizing that it was a lot of it generated by COVID, a lot of the reduction. I’m wondering if we were on track prior to COVID. So perhaps we weren’t going, we have some time to get to that 5% goal but were we on track to meet our targets even without COVID? Thank you for that to staff for a reply.

Through the chair, that is very much the case. What we’ve cautioned in the report is that we actually had a significant process or progress towards that goal. Some of that is likely to bounce back. We’re going to be watching that very closely but it has illustrated what can be accomplished when we do make some process changes, some changes with how we work from home.

All these things are going to continue to be discussed as opportunities to continue to move forward, not only for these goals, but also for future corporate goals. Thank you. Councillor Cassidy, if you have anything right now, I’ll let you go, but if not, Councillor Turner is in queue. Okay, thank you.

Thank you for the Councillor Turner. Thanks Madam Chair. And I have comments on a few things. So one just to jump in off of where Councillor Cassidy addressed with the corporate energy consumption report.

This is very helpful. These are certainly things that we need to be live to. And in recognizing where we’ve made those strides and the largest of course, being in the wastewater and treatment section, that’s huge market reduction since 2007 and the amount of energy spent on that, it seems to be owing to the methods that we use to dehydrate the waste and for shipping out whatever’s left from the sewage treatment. The part that jumps out to me a little bit is that we’ve really made almost no progress on the fleet side of things.

The fleet continues to have pretty much the same level of emissions and energy consumption since the outset. And that compares interestingly to the community energy consumption reports, which show that despite the increasing the amount of vehicles that there’s actually been a fairly marked decrease in the amount of energy consumed by those vehicles. So the first question is just with respect to that. I saw in the report, there’s discussion about to try and move towards the right sizing and hybrid vehicles and things like to those ends.

But how can we really move the needle on our energy consumption and greenhouse gas emissions associated with our fleet through your metal chair? Thank you, Councillor Turner to staff for a reply. Through the chair, it’s Jay Stanford here. I’ll start off and Mr.

Bushby, who’s also on the line may wish to add a few comments as well. Fleet is definitely a challenge. Now we saw a rise actually in 2020 because of the need for actually introducing additional vehicles to keep people safe as part of our fleet complement. But the work that was actually approved just before the pandemic hit on our new green fleet strategy has us bringing in more green vehicles over a period of time.

For example, on the report today, you’ll actually see the recommended purchase of our new compressed natural gas vehicles for garbage collection and green bin materials. That’s an example of following through on a council approval to begin a switch to a cleaner fuel and one that actually produces fewer greenhouse gases. The challenge in fleet will continue over the next couple years and that is why we’re gonna continue to focus our time and effort on that. There are some long sales cycles between getting in new vehicles, but the work ahead of us is getting better understood because some of it actually deals with driver behavior.

And we have programs now that are gonna begin to emerge on how we can actually work with our telematics equipment that is in our vehicles to help us really adjust how we drive our vehicles, how we further reduce idling of fleet vehicles and move forward with that part of the strategy. Council turn, you’re quite correct. It is an area that needs much more work and that is part of our plan. Mr.

Bush, be anything further from you, if I may? Thanks, Jay, and to the council. Yes, I think you touched on a number of the bigger factors. Of course, the EV side of things, we’re still struggling with supply issues, the availability of EVs.

But we are trying to align ourselves very closely with ensuring that we’re ready to go. So we’ve applied for a three-year staff, Jay, a lot of any incentives to have the infrastructure in the ground for charging systems. So all of those things are working so that we’re aligned very closely when things come in line. And then in terms of the CNG, the fuel switching, that’s a really good process in the heavy side to be able to try and meet some of our GHG reduction goals.

The last couple years has been impacted, obviously, by COVID. So we have more wheels on the ground, which is kind of counteracting some of our opportunities there. But in the telematics that I think it’s really worth mentioning is really understanding the usage and trying to move towards pooling of vehicles to see if we can start to work more and have a model that would share vehicles amongst the staff is another initiative that we’re working on in the next few months. Thank you.

Councillor Turner. Right, thank you to both for those answers. On page 15, figure five, one of the things that, when I look at graphs, we’ve got a projected line that gets us to the Met Zero by 2050 and that extends off of the future greenhouse gas emissions solid line in line with the 2019 to 2023 plan actions. The line isn’t really an extension.

If we were to take the trend line from the 2019 to 2023 CDM action plans, the dotted line, the impact of forecasted or sorry, trend line for reaching net zero, those two actually diverge a fair amount. And so I think that that needs to be represented a little bit better or do we actually think that there’s going to be a sharp turn in the trend that’s already existed so far? ‘Cause I think that the trend line of where things are going right now versus where we want things to go are two separate lines and seeing the difference between those helps us to understand how much more action we need to do so that those two lines are the same. So perhaps through Madam Chair to staff to see how we might take actions to make sure that we’re corrected onto that trend line or desired trend line.

Thank you, to staff. Through the Chair, on that graph, that’s right. The line is basically a straight line. What we are trying to do right now is to develop what that 2050 or even sooner 2040 line will look like where we get to net zero as a corporation.

So work is underway right now at a number of our buildings, a number of our operational facilities to do with a water and wastewater to go almost facility by facility to determine what those changes would be, including the addition of solar panels, other types of renewable energy production. That will all be part of a further report coming forward. We will be covering off some of that in our climate emergency action plan, as you heard coming later this fall. Parts of that will be stuff that will be work in progress.

A number of the changes that we wish to make in the future, some of these are entering to areas where technology is just developing now. So that is part of when you look at a longer horizon is that we can work with details that we have at hand right now, but also we continue to explore what is coming around the corner in the way of electric vehicles, as Mr. Bushly had mentioned, as well as other opportunities for renewable energy, all part of a plan being developed right now. Sir, turn anything further, ‘cause I had Councillor Halmer in the queue when you’re finished.

Thanks, I have a couple more. So moving on to the community plan, the community energy greenhouse use. These are very helpful for us to see as a community. This really sets up our question when we have our discussion about major transportation projects.

It’s quite clear from this that transportation and personal vehicles are one of the largest contributors to greenhouse gases within our municipality. And that’s really important. I think having a discussion with somebody on social media the other night, having concerns about the major transportation projects lens, but this is how everything gets into related, right? Just the reduction in travel reduces our greenhouse gas emissions, but it’s also the way we build our communities in such a way that we have less distance to travel, to get to work, to get to social events, to get to shopping and things like that.

So, and that’s also how we decrease our building use energy consumption as well. I had a question, I know we’re gonna get to 2.14 later, but 2.13 specifically the screening tool. And it’s nice to see these screening tools start to come into play and starting to see what those tools look like. I’m wondering if this is the final, if there’s opportunities for recommendations in here as these are being developed.

One of the things that I noticed was in those screening tools, it asks a lot of questions. When we go through EAs, we look at the preferred alternative and we look at three or four other alternatives. And it would be helpful when we’re looking at any options that are coming forward to say, okay, here’s the preferred alternative. Are the other alternatives offering other opportunities for better or better impact mitigation or better benefits environmentally than the one that’s being offered as the preferred alternative?

And I don’t see that in the screening tool. I’m also curious how this allows us to be able to see at a glance how the proposal differs from what business as usual might look like through amount of chair to staff. Thank you, Mr. Stanford.

Through the chair, a couple of ways of responding to this one. Let me first work with the environmental assessment for proposed expansion of the W12A landfill site. In that case, very large EA, we have followed the government requirements for looking at climate change mitigation adaptation across four different scenarios. So in that case, that process allows for the ability to see how the differences occur, as well from a cost perspective, but also an environmental perspective.

So it is built into a large government process. In that case, the climate lens being used at the city on city projects is going through an evolution. So your first question is the room for comments and the answer is always. It is something that we’re hearing directly from the staff we’re working with internally and others are providing comments as these start seeing our information appear.

We’re also learning from other communities as they begin to apply variations of a climate lens. So there will be an evolution there. The opportunity to look at changes does exist. And I think this is what you’re seeing and part of the discussion on the transportation projects with the lens being used there.

So I guess the best way to capture it is there are opportunities for improvement for sure. What you’re seeing now in the waste management report was a very thorough look at small projects and large projects. And we’ve indicated in the report, for example, that there’s some things that we must dive into deeper because an environmental benefit might also result in increased gas reduction, greenhouse gas increases. It could also, they could both be a positive in the way of both have a reduction and an environmental benefit.

So there are going to be some opportunities for trade-offs. So in that particular report, we highlight the key projects that we’re going to be looking at next, in particular, our ongoing work with renewable natural gas at the landfill site. And there will be some trade-offs in that particular project on where we put our investment in the future. So hopefully that’s touched on some of your question and comments, Councillor Turner.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman Madam Chair, thank you, Mr. Sanford. Yeah, it does.

And it’s good to hear that there are a process that evolves. I recognize we’re not going to hit all the points right off the gates, but we’re, as I said, to be commended for getting a process in place so that environmental impacts can be evaluated as we look at the municipal projects. And outside of the EA system, the EA’s, as you mentioned, are very much built to identify those impacts and the alternatives and the impacts that they might have. I think one of the other things that I would consider as you’re building out your screening tool would be some way of quantifying impacts.

The questions as they tend to be rather subjective. Will it, yes or no? And it might be fairly loose, but being able to quantify and say, okay, this project, we’ll see a 15% reduction in greenhouse gas emissions or a 20% reduction in costs, perhaps, associated with that and reduction in waste, those kind of things are end up being really helpful to then put forward, especially to us as Council, to say, yeah, we consider those and we’re actually getting more bang for the buck and more impacts associated with this project. 30 seconds.

So, yeah, that’s all I have to say. Thank you very much. Thank you, and as always, I’m happy to come back to other Councillors as we move through. And we do have some guests with us today.

So if they would like to add comments to any of the consent items, please just raise your hand virtually and I’d be happy to recognize you. Councillor Helmer is next on my speaker’s list. Thanks very much through the Chair, just two fairly brief comments. Now, first one is on the city’s work on energy consumption reductions.

And I didn’t want to let it go by without mentioning the amazing project that is the organic rank and cycle engine, the wastewater treatment plan. I know that the staff are recognized for the work on that project when the city got the award from AMO for the Canada Community Building Fund investment into the organic rank and cycle engine. This is a great example of something that really dramatically reduces energy usage by the city by recovering the waste heat and using that in a more productive way than just letting it dissipate. It’s about 12% of our overall energy reduction achieved just by that one project, which is a huge, huge step forward.

And it has the added benefit of saving $600,000 a year, which is really beneficial for the wastewater ratepayers, especially in the long run after we get through the recovery of the capital cost of doing the project, which were dramatically cut by the federal government supporting it. ISO put in the grant as well to help us do that project. And I just want to say that’s a really good example of very positive sort of win, win, win kind of project. And I wanted to just mention it today.

The second thing I wanted to comment on is the resilience infrastructure funding, which this is something that the federal government put in place quite rapidly. And I’m glad to see that we are able to deploy those funds in the timeline that we had to work with, which was quite short. You know, we have to have these projects finished by the end of this year. I know we’re signing the transfer payment agreement now, but the projects have been underway for a long time.

And I really appreciated that over $5 million in support from the federal government to help with these projects that otherwise would have been delayed. You know, we wouldn’t have got to them as quickly. They wouldn’t be benefiting Londoners this year. We’d be waiting for them for many more years.

And I think it was a great way of making our community more resilient to future pandemics or the current one that we’re still struggling through and also getting these projects done much sooner. So thanks very much to the federal government for making that happen. Thank you, Councillor Hopkins. Welcome to committee and please proceed.

Thank you, Madam Chair, for recognizing me. And I just want to make a couple of comments on two items here, 2.3, which is the Tender Award for the Dingman Creek Southwinds trip 12, natural channel reconstruction and flood mitigation. As you can see, it’s quite a large project. And I just want to thank staff for the work that they’re doing, working with the community and just making note of how this construction is going to affect the community that’s already existing there, as well as new development coming in.

And the importance of how we deal with our trees. And this is a great example. What staff are doing with the community, relocating large trees and having that conversation with the community. I want to give my thanks to staff for doing that as well.

‘Cause this is such a naturalized area and people really do take a lot of pleasure in living next to a naturalized environment, which I think with this project will become even a better area to develop naturalization. But do want to make another comment on 2.10, which is the amendments to the traffic and parking by-law. Ward 9 is congested. We have difficulties moving around and subdivisions are coming forward fast and furious, which is a good thing to see.

But how we move around these subdivisions is becoming an ongoing challenge. And I know there are a number of stop signs coming in the Talbot Village, a subdivision, for instance. That subdivision was started back probably 20 years ago and we’ve still have a number of stages. But the challenges as we move around really do affect the quality of life in these subdivisions and really appreciate how we do the traffic calming with the stop signs and hoping the reduction of our speed limits will also make out roads safer.

So thanks again to staff. Thank you for those comments and for joining us, Councillor Hopkins. Looking to committee for any other questions or comments. I have a couple of comments to make myself, but we’ll let committee obviously go first if they have anything else to add, Councillor Turner.

Just wanted to add one thing that’s more of an observation, but with respect to the community energy consumption profile. So it’s noted in there the move towards larger vehicles by individuals and that is a concerning trend because as we move towards those larger vehicles, this community and further away from cars or smaller vehicles, there’s a fairly significant increase in energy consumption that goes with there. anecdotally, I was just looking at Fort Canada’s website and in their entire vehicle inventory, they have one car. They’ve phased out their entire vehicle inventory on the forts before cars, everything else is an SUV or a truck.

And so those are trends we have to watch. And those are trends that we have to be concerned about as a community if we’re going to make impacts on our goals with climate change. Thank you, Councillor Turner, be referring to page 142 that notes an increase in per capita use of vehicle ownership within London and a remarked increase in size of said vehicles. And obviously it noted majority of those occupancies were one person per vehicle and raising some safety concerns for those who use active transportation.

So definitely a concern and on many Councillors’ minds. For committee’s FYI knowledge, item 2.2, it’s removal of a temporary stormwater management facility coming to us in the future after the pond is removed as staff’s intention to turn those lots back into housing as it is in a residential neighborhood that will come back in the future and wonderful to hear that that will be a complete neighborhood with more people finding residents within it. In regards to item 2.4 and 2.7, these are consulting engineers for wastewater treatment plant condition assessment and asset valuations, recognizing the city has a $1 billion asset in wastewater treatment and currently a $16 million infrastructure gap as city’s budget chair looking forward to those reports coming back to shore up exactly what those numbers are and what’s needed, recognizing climate change and the increase in frequency and severity of storms to help keep Londoner safe and manage all our assets. In regards to item 2.5, stormwater management facility, the build out of the sediment survey, Mr.

Mathers, if I could just have you speak to it briefly as we did have a conversation beforehand of the amount of sediment in the maintenance cycle every 10 to 15 years of, as these neighborhoods are being built out and particularly how it relates to the development charges, making sure that developers are actually paying for development. Through the chair, absolutely. As noted, it is a significant concern for us to ensure that stormwater ponds aren’t filled with sediment at the point when the city becomes responsible for those ponds. The goal of a pond is to be able to remove sediment and the ideal situation is that once the entire build out of the subdivision occurs that the pond has relatively little sediment in it, then over time, five, 10, 15 years that it eventually will fill the sediment just through the normal course of cars driving and people using the neighborhood, but the intent is not to have a pond that’s absolutely full right on day one.

So what we wanna do is try to understand throughout the city is how large an issue that this is and then come up with some options and work with the development community to understand how we can have better erosion and sediment control throughout our community. And ideally, as part of the development charges process that will be moving forward in the next few years, come up with plans policies or even programs to try to reduce the sediment loading that’s within these ponds and just ensure that the taxpayer or the rate pair doesn’t have to bear the cost of the cleanouts of these ponds moving forward, which could be between $200,000 and $500,000 for each individual clean out. So thank you. Perfect, Deputy Mayor Morgan.

Yes, on that very specific item, I wanna commend Mr. Mathers and his team for the recent sediment removal in stormwater management pond in Hyde Park area. One of the things that they were able to do was relocate a good, pretty much all of the wildlife, including fish, which have somehow gotten to the pond in a very friendly sort of way that was sensitive to the living creatures that often move their way into what starts to become naturalized areas. I think the community understood that the pond does need sediment removal but also was greatly appreciative of how respectful our staff’s approach was with the consultant that we hired to do that.

And on that, given what Mr. Mathers just said, as you investigate the costs of sediment removal, I think it’s important to ensure that those secondary costs that might be related like wildlife relocation are also considered in the process that you’re undertaking. And again, I think it was quite successful in the Hyde Park pond, but we had the advantage of having a second cell right nearby, which allowed for options that might not be available elsewhere and there might be more costly solutions that are needed. So I just wanted to add that context and that compliment to Mr.

Mathers and his team. Thank you for that feedback and a point to consider for staff. And as always, praise the staff. It’s appreciated when a job well done is recognized.

My final points or question is gonna be for Mr. Stanford. If you just wanna take a moment, recognizing there’s lots of things in regards to waste and recognizing the landfill is within word 12 and the aid that we have undergoing in regards to item 2.13 and 2.17. Recognizing it’s the report stated that 7% methane is coming from food waste and we’re concerned about the landfill gas collection and green bins and how the city is proceeding with that.

If you just wanna speak overall of waste management and a few of the few things on this report that recognizing the split stream rear loading waste vehicles is a $10 million investment on its own just for a general update for Londoners in the committee. Thank you, Madam Chair. The green bin program, as you see in our report, moving forward, obviously, and the purchase of the vehicles is a key step in that process. When we look at organics that are in the waste stream, of course, they’re in and around 30% by weight.

So that is why they’ve always been a target in this community. But one of our key goals, of course, is to first implement a food waste avoidance program to prevent as much of that from entering either the waste stream or the future green bin stream. Keeping those materials out of the landfill site, of course, have the added advantage of reducing odors at the landfill site. And let’s face it here.

Anything that goes into the landfill site essentially is a bit of a lost resource. Yes, it does contribute to our landfill gas collection system and our future renewable gas collection system. Should we get that in place? But anytime we can prevent those materials from occurring, there’s also a greenhouse gas benefit.

Because the whole food system, whether it is farming or through the transportation to get the food to us, we have greenhouse gas impacts and energy use that goes alongside with that. Our program here has been developing over a number of years and then with the 60% waste diversion program and Council’s approval, we are moving forward with a strong attack on food waste. It is the number one item in the garbage bag. It represents not only a resource, but as I’ve mentioned, more importantly, reducing in the first place benefits lenders, both from a greenhouse gas perspective, but we cannot forget the financial benefit.

Wasted food is basically dollars lost that are into a garbage bag. We have done recent work in London that has highlighted that anywhere between 80 and $100 million per year of wasted food is in the garbage bag. So there’s multiple reasons to be working closely on all these waste diversion initiatives and the green bin and the work on our food waste avoidance are all tied in to the food waste and the food management system. And of course, to our overall waste management system, which is a greenhouse gas item that is of concern and when we’re putting a lot of attention to and one of our reports here today talks about what we’re doing today, what we’ve done in the past and what we have to achieve in the future.

Hopefully that covers off enough of the items, Adam, sure that you wish to discuss at this point in time. Perfect, that’s wonderful. It was just a broad update in lots happening with climate and waste management from the city at this moment. Looking to committee or guests to see if there’s any final questions.

Seeing none, I will now seek a mover and a seconder from committee of all consent items with exception of 2.14 and 2.15. I have a mover and Councillor Cassidy and a wonderful seconder and Councillor. This could be you. I need a seconder, Councillor Turner.

Thank you so much. The vote will now be opening any scribe. Closing the vote, the motion carries six to zero. Thank you, that puts us on to item 2.14, an outcome of climate lens screening applied to major transportation projects.

Councillor van Merbergen asked for this one to be pulled and Mr. Chair is available to give an overview or any questions that you have to this. So I will turn to Councillor van Merbergen to see what your preference is. I think it would be helpful if we had an overview and perhaps within the overview, we could hear if this project were to go ahead, the way it was intended, what type of timeline would we be looking at in terms of actual construction and completion?

So if we could hear that, that would be great. Thank you for that. So to Ms. Chair for an overview of the climate lens screening applied to major transportation projects.

And if we did proceed the timelines that we’d be looking at, Ms. Chair. Thank you, Madam Chair. I had shared with majority of my opening comments that I earlier on, certainly the results of the review have confirmed that there is a need for us to move to complete streets cross sections for major roads within the city of London.

That includes providing four travel lanes, protected bike facility and pedestrian facility on either side. And that base approach for mobility for major facilities is really important to support driving, walking, cycling, transit, growth and a number of factories. Where we’re really seeing that there’s no benefit beyond that is when we start looking to alleviate congestion where a road is already essentially complete. Adding additional lanes to reduce delay is a temporary investment that mitigates a current problem that creates a long-term issue in terms of the environmental impact.

It also creates significant barriers for pedestrians, particularly those who require more time to cross a wider cross section. So even some of the efficiency we gain by adding extra travel lanes is absorbed by the need to lengthen the signal timing on the cross streets to allow people to cross that much wider cross section on foot. So we are recommending not proceeding with expansion of roadways beyond what we would consider a complete street for vehicle lanes, potentially transit facilities where those would make sense. Cycling and pedestrian facilities on both sides.

With respect to Wonderland in particular, I’m gonna have Mr. McCray to review the project schedule and timelines is he’s more familiar with those details. Thank you, Mr. McCray.

Yeah, thank you. The Wonderland Road improvements are all phased out. Multiple phases just based on the magnitude of the project. It’s also in the multi-year budget and development charges background study.

It’s broken down into 10 different phases beginning in 2025 and extending out to 2037. And so the initial phases are, you know, start at the intersections and then grow from there. Councillor van Merber going to follow up question. No, I appreciate that information.

Perhaps I could just give a comment. This project has been on the books for years. It’s been part of the transportation master plan for many years. There is an expectation in this community throughout all of London that this go ahead.

It just seems not in the best interests of the city of London to all of a sudden apply the breaks and in effect apply a moratorium on what is badly needed. I would suggest certainly given from the feedback I’m getting from my constituents, most Londoners know that there is a need to widen this road. It is continually congested. And the rationale that we’re using to give to the community as to why we’re not going ahead is somewhat perplexing.

If you look at the short term, by not going ahead, you’re just encouraging more congestion and island. People need Wonderland Road, not only for the movement of persons, but also goods and services and to reach those goods and services and to in effect maximize an efficient economic development. It’s hard to emphasize how important Wonderland is in terms of a major North-South corridor for all of London. So we hear this, and as I said in the short term, we have an increase in pollution because we all know that increase of idling of engines and congestion and traffic jams counter to what we’re trying to achieve.

It’s not helping climate change. Then we look at the longer term and the market right now is undergoing fundamental transition actually in a very forceful, proactive, rapid way towards electric vehicles. We already see the Ford Mustang electrified. The best selling vehicle that Ford produces is the F-150.

And it now has an electric version. The governments of Canada and the United States are also pushing with all of this transition going on, as I said, in a rapid way. How much sense does this actually make to congest this road further? And as we just heard till the year 2037, even if this goes ahead properly, it won’t be done till 2037.

And by that time, these electric vehicles will be everywhere. And so nothing is coming out, there’s no emissions, there’s no contribution to certainly not from the vehicles themselves to climate change gases. So when you take a step back and look at this in the bigger picture, it really doesn’t make sense. I know we’re employing, I’m hearing all this talk about lenses, this lens, that lens.

In this case, it looks like it’s the climate change lens. But let’s not forget that we need a logic and common sense lens as well. When we look at these major projects, like the Wonderland Road widening, the city’s been waiting an awful long time for this. And in the view of, I would suggest the majority of Londoners, it needs to go ahead without delay.

One last point I’d like to make, and that is in terms of accommodating bicycles and buses, it certainly was apparent to me up until now that that was part of the process. It’s already baked into the cake, as it were, to delay this so that we can further explore bikes and buses, again, is not really adding up. Could I ask Steph, is that not the case that already in the planning, the consultation that’s already taking place, the EA itself, that we have been looking at, where buses and bikes fit in? Certainly, to Ms.

Cher, or Mr. McCray. Yes, early, I can confirm that the Discover Wonderland, EA does consider all modes at a multi-modal level of service type of approach. That said, we’re, you know, a major component, the big cost driver and the driver of the phasing and the fundamental of the project is around the sixth laning of the corridor.

And given that, we were recommending that it would be best informed by the upcoming development of the Mobility Master Plan, where that’ll take a more high-level strategic look and using the inputs of the Climate Emergency Action Plan, but also updated growth forecasts, as well as all the conversations that led with Londoners that will occur to find out how Wonderland can best fit in to the broader network within the broader city network. Follow-up, Councillor Van Merbergen. Yeah, thank you for that. I’d also like to point out that with further congestion on Wonderland, all you’re doing is encouraging more cut through the various neighborhoods, cut through traffic through all the neighborhoods that’s sprout out along the length of Wonderland, the numerous neighborhoods, that too is a negative.

30 seconds. And so for all of these reasons, I cannot support a moratorium on going ahead with this most important project. So thank you very much, Chair. That concludes my comments.

Thank you, Councillor. And as always, everyone’s welcome to chime back in after first round, opening it up to committee members and any guests who would like to comment on item 2.14 or have questions for staff regarding the climate screening applied to major transportation projects or as the mobility master plan and growth forecast has been mentioned as well and anything regarding to those. So turning to committee. Okay, I’m gonna recognize committee members first.

I do see Councillor Layman has joined us today. So welcome, but I will go to Councillor Cassidy first. Thank you, Madam Chair. And I might have more comments later, but right now I just have a couple of questions.

Number one, recognizing that there is a congestion issue on many of our streets, but Wonderland Road definitely has one. I’m wondering if the intelligent traffic management system that’s being rolled out will help in some way to create a more efficient flow of traffic. If this will help with some of the bottlenecking and traffic jams that take place at peak hours. So I wonder if Ms.

Chair or Mr. McCrae or somebody has a response back. Thank you to staff. It’s yes, through the chair of the Tim’s project or the intelligent traffic signals projects certainly is actively working on the congestion issue across the city.

It recognizes the congestion is a challenge. It’s as much as it’s the sign about a healthy environment city. It does need to be managed and minimized as much as possible. And one of the key components of the Tim’s project is using the most recent technologies to measure travel times to help manage it.

Other components of that project are the upgrades to the back end software that is in place. The rollout of individual traffic signal controllers at every signalized intersection that is underway. The installation of traffic cameras is also underway and those feedback to our new transportation management center. So yes, all of those aspects are aimed at squeezing out more efficiency on the existing corridors in the network.

Thank you, Councilor Cassidy. Yeah, one more question about the design of the current design of the road. It was designed obviously quite some time ago. As part of the upgrade or the new transportation master plan that we’re looking forward to, is there a possibility to improve the road as it’s currently viewed as a complete street based on the number of lanes and the added infrastructure there?

But is there a view that it could be improved further while maintaining the current number of lanes but improving efficiency through design and improving infrastructure for pedestrians and cyclists? Are these the kinds of things that might be looked at rather than simply widening the road? Thank you for that question to staff. Yes, certainly.

There are additional engineering measures that can be applied to the Wonderland Road corridor and many of these don’t take, don’t require an environmental assessment. So included in those could be improved access management is to better manage the flow of traffic. It could be localized improvements like trans acute jump lanes, for example, or other measures to improve traffic flow. And as you mentioned, improved active transportation.

So as much as we recognize that the corridor is relatively complete from a multimodal perspective right now, there are improvements that can be applied to the corridor on a go forward basis. And to supplement those from a softer, from a non-engineering perspective, we would look at the characteristics of the traffic flow on the corridor and recognizing that there are peak hours and trying to support and encourage personal interventions such as traveling during the off peak hours, recognizing that we have those during Monday to Friday, those peak hours in the morning, and afternoons and midday on the weekend. So encouraging travel time choices from individuals, working with employers to really help lever off some of the adaptations that we’ve seen during COVID with employers, for example, flexible hours items like that. So also some potential improvements on the softer side.

Thank you. Councillor CASSIDY, I do have Councillor Layman next if you for (indistinct) Perfect, if you have more, I’m happy to come back. So I will recognize Councillor Layman. Welcome to Civic Works.

Please proceed with your comments. Good to be back at Civic Works. Thank you, Chair, for recognizing me. I have a few comments and then I have a couple of questions through your chair for staff.

Back in the ’70s, we had an opportunity to have a ring room, which I think in hindsight, we probably wish we might have done a different direction on that. What has evolved for our North South roots, we’ve evolved into three major North South roots, Veterans Memorial, which we’ve recently upgraded, Wellington Street, which we’re about to embark on a major widening there in expansion to provide our greater access from the South and 401 to the core, and Wonderland Road. Wonderland Road, it’s the last crossing of the river in the West, in the West end. We’ve seen major growth in not only the Northwest, but also in the South.

What we’re seeing is a lot of increased traffic in North South. We’re seeing folks going to work. I’m speaking primarily from my ward, which is more in the North, to the South end. And we’re also seeing a lot of traffic accessing the 401 through Wonderland Road throughout the day.

We’re also seeing the increased traffic from the South end accessing some major commercial hubs, Costco, Soweeza and Farm Boy, and also Walmart, and that huge commercial and that’s accessed off of Fanshawe. So speaking more from the perspective of my ward and what’s around my ward, we see major choke points at the bridge at rush hour from Spring Bank down the riverside, then again in Oxford, and then again at Beaverbrook and Sarnia Road, and probably further, but those, I’m just going to deal with the ones closest to my ward. We’re seeing people wait for multiple lights to change and we’re only having difficulty making left-hand turns. So I guess I want to ask staff right now, we’ll suspending the Wonderland EA, handcuff your hands in widening specific sections of Wonderland to address this traffic congestion.

Thank you to staff for a response. The recommendation to suspend is tied with a further review under the Mobility Master Plan, and so certainly not the recommendations as proposed in the report certainly would not bind the Mobility Master Plan in its recommendation or preclude any future council directed improvements to the corridor. Thank you. And I’m going to ask, I apologize if this is too specific.

I want to talk about Beaverbrook and Wonderland. Beaverbrook is a street that winds its way from Oxford behind Costco and then up across is Wonderland on the way to Farmway and then into a major neighborhood area. Since I’ve been counselor, I’ve had many complaints about folks trying to navigate their way through this intersection. It’s a one lane and a turning lane intersection for Beaverbrook and folks are having trouble getting across before the light changes, resulting in long traffic lines on both sides of the street.

And I’ve been told that adjusting the lights and if you can see the lights and advanced screens, et cetera, et cetera, because of the domino effect it has on other lights along Wonderland, we’re not able to achieve a successful solution to this problem and the solution lane in widening the road and wait for that and that’s when we can hope to get some relief. So I want to know if there are alternate plans on this intersection if the widening of Wonderland Road is suspended. Thank you to staff. Yeah, thank you.

We’ve discussed and staff are certainly cognizant of localized challenges on the corridor and Beaverbrook is one location and it’s actually the challenges are more on the crossing street than Wonderland and it’s related primarily to access management and also some local design issues. So there are potential improvements that can be made locally at that location and that would be part of the considerations for the broader corridor review under the mobility master plan looking at those localized challenges and fitting them in with the higher level broader strategies that the mobility master plan will develop. Thank you, Jared, just a couple of final comment, I guess. We’ve had a number of public participation meetings on the plans here.

I was impressed with some interesting cycling options that were included to provide greater access down to the river and TVP. But I always have been concerned about the price tag on this, it’s fairly substantial. So, I’m open to hearing suggestions from council on a other ideas to address the choke points that I mentioned ‘cause at the end of the day we wanna move traffic through London as efficiently as possible but also most cost effectively as possible as we respect taxpayers’ dollars. So thank you for allowing me to speak to the committee.

Thank you for joining us and it was lovely to have you back. I have in my next speaker’s list, Councillor Hopkins followed by Deputy Mayor Morgan and then Councillor Turner. I am timing everyone, Councillor Hopkins, please proceed. Thank you, Madam Chair and thank you for recognizing me.

I do have a couple of questions and maybe just starting off with a quick comment when I moved to London back in the late ’80s, Wonderland was a two lane highway and then we went four and 30 years later we’re looking at six lanes and that is where I’d like to ask my question. This is the widening of six lanes. I represent the award that is really self-dale along Wonderland and I have had questions from residents wanting really pleased to know that we’re going to be extending to six lanes right along the corridor and I would like through you, Madam Chair, to staff to ask specifically where is this six lane widening? Where does it start and where does it end?

Is my first question. Perfect, thank you, Mr. McCrae. The Discover Wonderland EA Environmental Assessment has limits that extend from Southdale Road up to Sarnia Road.

So that is the area that that environmental assessment contemplates and has the potential that the environmental assessment wasn’t finalized. It’s just I just went through the first stage of consultation, but that was the area that was in question. Thank you for that clarity because of Southdale on Wonderland. I know there are plans for widening and I heard from staff through the course of this conversation that it’s not going to preclude changes along that Wonderland corridor that have been planned and the mobility master plan is something that is going to be looked at to recognize the challenges.

And I just like to say we have many challenges as we develop in the Southwest and as we move around and as we encourage economic development, the challenges where we become rural and urban, start to clash. And I am really pleased to know that we are going to have that mobility master plan. The community is very interested in being part of that. And through you, Madam Chair, if I can ask my final question on that plan, the community engagement process and how that is going to work.

Mr. McCrae. Yeah, thank you through the chair. The mobility master plan is something that we’re very excited about and are starting to create the work plan for which will include a very thorough and inclusive consultation and engagement program.

So it’s something that we’re going to be returning to a committee later this fall, but certainly it’s recognized that it needs to be innovative and inclusive plan that really engages all Londoners. We want to focus on moving people more so than moving vehicles and recognizing as our city grows and all as all city grows, we come up against challenges like the ones we’re talking about today and recognizing that we need to go beyond short-term fixes, think long-term and that can be informed by hearing about some of the challenges that Londoners are facing. So certainly the engagement is going to be something that we will be very active on and certainly there will be opportunities for counselors to participate in that process going forward. Councillor Hopkins, anything further?

No, I just want to thank staff for their comments and allowing me to ask these questions and looking forward to hearing the conversation from committee. Thank you. Thank you again for joining us. I will now recognize Deputy Mayor Morgan.

Thank you, Chair. I wanted to make just a few comments. First off, I think it’s really easy, particularly for the word counselors who face the questions from constituents about the challenges along the stretch of road to be very sensitive to finding solutions to the problems. And I think where we have to be careful is the perception that the solution is a $200 million 12-year road widening project, right?

And I think that’s where Councillor Layman’s comments come from where you’re seeing us try to identify some issues that we would like to see resolved in some way. And I’m trying my best not to get hung up on what the right solution is. And so I appreciate that our staff are exercising that caution to say a road widening may not solve the problems that you’re talking about. It’s more complicated than that.

And there are other options that we can consider. And so I can be supportive and I will be supportive of staff’s recommendation to suspend that EA and look for alternatives. But I think what we need to focus on is how are we going to start to address these problems? Is the integrated traffic management system going to be?

Are there localized improvements? Are there intersection improvements? Are there ways that we can flow traffic through the intersections more efficiently? And if all of those don’t work, are there areas where we may need to still strategically widen to accommodate some increased flow of vehicles and keep the rest of traffic moving?

So I think all of those things are on the table. Even in the staff report, it says the widening of corridors, particularly to six lanes that are already mostly complete streets, is recommended for reconsideration under the Mobility Master Plan development. In other words, we can take a very complete assessment of all of these different potential solutions, but not necessarily exclude any from solving the different challenges that we may face along a road like Wonderland Road. So to me, like at the end of the day, I don’t want to spend a whole ton of money and not solve problems for our residents.

And so I’m very open to the conversation about how we tackle those solutions or how we find those solutions. And I think that the path that staff have carved out is a way for us to step back, reflect on all the options we have before us and then pitch some ideas. But I can tell you what is absolutely sure is that the counselors who are in the areas representing the constituents are going to look to those specific challenges that we see along the roadway and where the solutions are trying to make that better. If not a six lane road widening, then what is it that we can do?

And I think the Mobility Master Plan will allow us the opportunity to both have staff investigate and pitch us options, as well as engage with the public on how they feel about those options. So I’ll support the staff report today and I think it’s great work. And I will say on the climate screening tool, it’s also great to see that there are a number of large infrastructure projects that the screening tool has applied the lens to and said, you know what? These are great projects to move forward with.

This is, it’s not a climate emergency does not mean we stop all infrastructure spending, but it means that we’re going to step back and look at it through a specific lens and take some time to try to find alternatives that may have a positive impact on both the environment as well as solve some of the challenges we have. So that’s where I am today. I wouldn’t share my thoughts with the committee and I appreciate the chair giving me some time. Thanks.

Thank you, Deputy Mayor. And thank you for joining us. Councilor Turner is my final speaker. So if anyone else would like to chime in, just raise your hand.

I’ll recognize you after Councilor Turner. Thank you, Madam Chair. Thanks to my colleagues for their thoughts and insights on this. I think Councilor Morgan and Deputy Mayor Morgan rounded it out right at the end.

They’re talking about what this is really about. This is about the screen tool. In there happens to be one recommendation for one project for modification that’s a bit of a lightning rod in this discussion. But the screen tool and the application of the screening tool is starting to show where those benefits might be.

It’s leading us to rethink a $200 million project. And that’s impressive. For us to try and take a look and say, well, wait a second. Business as usual and a regular mentality and thoughts on things has led us one way and almost like a consistent march towards that without really stopping and pausing and thinking, is this actually going to solve the problems that we wanted to?

And Councilor Layman’s bang on identified the question about when we look at Wonderland Road, the things that caused the congestion isn’t its capacity. It’s the point source impacts. It’s all these things that enter into the road along the way. And how does traffic leave those plazas and shopping malls and apartment buildings and all of those things and enter onto the roadway?

Take a look at the Veteran Memorial Parkway. There’s very few point source inputs along the VMP and traffic moves quite smoothly along there. And it’s only two lanes wide on each side. It doesn’t need to be six lanes to be able to move people quickly.

So I think it’s going to be no surprise that I completely disagree with my colleague, Councilor Van Mirberg and on his perceptions on these. And I understand where he’s coming from. I think that it’s a traditional perspective, but it’s not the most current and most reflective of how things actually manifest and evolve in a city with respect to the idling concerns. Idling represents about 2% of all car emissions.

So as soon as you add 2% capacity to a roadway, any of those idling savings that you would have seen are gone. And adding another lane is going to add a bit more. In fact, I think that’s an additional 50% capacity to that roadway. A lot of discussion and planning about induced demand.

Yeah, as you increase capacity, you’re going to increase the number of cars as well. And you decrease the incentive for creating communities that are more connected and tighter so that the trips that you take aren’t as long. So if we’re actually going to make some impact and headway movement, it’s talking about how do we get people close to where they work, to where they live, to where they play, rather than having huge expanses and having to travel all the way from the north to the south. A number of us all represent constituencies that border our straddle Wonderland Road.

In fact, I don’t think any of our straddle Wonderland Road. I think we all have bought onto it. My ward runs from the river to commissioners along Wonderland. And that’s a fairly congested point.

I think about when I was driving ambulance in the city and some of the challenges that I faced in trying to get through traffic on Wonderland. One of the biggest impediments for me to be able to move quickly in an emergency vehicle was the fact that there’s an island that runs all the way down the center of Wonderland Road, which meant I couldn’t go into oncoming traffic to be able to go around any of that congestion. So it’s a lot, in fact, a lot of our past design choices that have led us to where we are today. Not so much a question of capacity.

It’s a question of how we interact with that road and being able to back up and say, how do we make smart choices and more contemporary choices on how we design and how we use the road that is going to have those larger impacts? 30 seconds. Yeah, so Madam Chair, if I could just ask for a quick extension, I don’t have a lot to say, but I did want to make a point here. Please proceed.

If this is your closing comments. Yeah, great. There’s a letter that’s attached to this file from our constituent and says that it makes a couple of really interesting points here that actually kind of defeat the argument that she’s trying to make. I think one is that we need to expand the road so that we can put more cars on it.

Do you really think that adding a bike lane is going to see more bikes? Well, if we’re putting car lanes and we say, yeah, more cars are going to go there. I think it follows and logically that is we put more capacity for bikes that we will see more people shift onto bikes and people will use those bike lanes. In fact, during the pandemic, we saw it was the only mode that increased in rideshare compared to all the others.

It went up by 21%, everything else went down by 20%. The pandemic’s a really important impact because people are starting to rethink the way they work. And so, needing the transportation corridor is based on the way we used to use roads and the city no longer applies. In the last moment, she identifies in here, was talking about the widening of Warren Cliff Road at Horton Street and Stanley Street, where we had to expropriate a property and we’ll have to demolish it.

One of the impacts of widening roads is that we have to take property from people. And that’s probably the most extreme exercise of municipal power that we have. We can’t do it without expropriations and it has significant impacts to those living along those corridors. Thank you, Madam Chair.

Thank you, Councillor Turner, just for clarification for the public. It’s demolition versus the moving of the house has not been confirmed yet as civic administration is still in talks with the ministry and we’ll wait for that report back later this fall. I will now recognize Councillor Halmer, followed by Councillor Cassidy. Thank you very much.

Through the chair, I wonder if we could just clarify a number of Councillors who referred to the total cost of the project that’s the subject of the EA. I know it’s a whole bunch of different projects and there’s been estimates made at different points in time about how much we think it will cost. I wonder perhaps through the chair of Mr. McCrae could clarify what the total budget estimate is for the Wonderland Road four to six lane widening.

Okay, Councillor Halmer, just for clarification, do you want that broken down into these 10 phases? Mr. McCrae spoke about or just overarching? No, the total.

Okay, perfect. Mr. McCrae. Yeah, thank you through the chair.

The total value of all of the phases from a capital cost perspective is 212 million. So that’s the value sort of the preliminary cost estimate for all those phases extended out to 2037. Okay, so my comments are gonna be very focused on the financial side of this project. So what we’re talking about is widening 8.2 kilometers of an existing four lane road to go to six lanes.

And the cost of that is going to be $212 million. That is a very significant amount of money per kilometer to add an extra lane along that stretch. Like it’s one of the most expensive projects you could possibly imagine. And what we’re seeing in the results from the climate change screening tool is that not only is it expensive, but it’s also gonna lead to greater emissions.

So, you know, this is the kind of analysis we really need to do on these major projects to say, is the benefit really there for the cost? Not just the financial costs, which is extremely high, but the environmental cost, which you also see is significant. So the widening of roads within your city to from four to six lanes, you know, I think you can only be justified in cases where you are adding a dedicated lane for transit. You know, that is where you get the efficiency of moving people, where adding a lane actually makes sense from a financial perspective and an environmental perspective.

Six lane roads, it’s basically the width of the 401. And, you know, why would you want something like that in the middle of your city when for most of the time, you know, I’m talking about like after rush hour, before rush hour, while people are at work, those roads are not congested. They often sit with very few cars on them, especially overnight when we’ve seen many people racing up and down roads that are wide open right now as they are at four lanes. And you have to build them initially, then you have to maintain them long-term and you have to replace them when they wear out.

And the cost of that is significant as well over time. And if you’re thinking about the fiscal sustainability of a city, the best way I have to think about it is, how many people do you have to look after each lane kilometer of road? Because along with the roads usually comes all the other infrastructure. And, you know, in London, we have about nine kilometers of road for every thousand people.

That’s not bad, but if we keep widening roads like this, we’re gonna get worse and worse and worse on that number. What we wanna do is make the most efficient use of our road network that we can as we add more and more people over time. And that’s gonna get us to financial sustainability. That’s what actually gets us to a more affordable city.

If we were to knock out $212 million out of the development charges projects, that would significantly reduce the development charges for a single family home in the city of London. Roads is about 20% of the development charges. This project is a huge chunk of the roads projects that are included in the DC. I think the DC would drop by about 10% just if this project were taken out.

That’s a huge thing. Like that’s taking it down from $33,000 for every unit to $30. Every unit would be $3,000 cheaper for a long period of time. And, you know, we’re looking at why is housing so unaffordable.

You know, the DC is a big chunk of the cost of bringing a new unit to the market. If we can avoid a growth project that is primarily DC, but then also property tax supported in its funding, we don’t have to do it and it’s not necessary. We can avoid the emissions and we can save all this money. That’s a very good, that’s a very good move.

So I support suspending the environmental assessment. I think it’s the right thing to do. I hope that we can resolve some of the pinch points along the corridor in a much more cost effective way. You know, you think about what we’re doing with the intelligent signals and managing the traffic and the flow.

You think about how much less that costs than widening. And I think we can do things like that that are going to move people faster and more efficiently throughout the city without incurring all these extra costs of widening roads. So I do support suspending the EA. I think it’s a good outcome from the climate screening tool.

Thank you, Councilor Helmer and right on your five minute mark, excellent job. Councilor Cassidy is the last person I have on my speakers list. And then I have a look to committee’s direction for a mover and a seconder. And certainly we can split this one up if Councilor’s prefer.

Thank you, Madam Chair. I just wanna talk about a concept of that Ms. Chair brought up and that’s the idea of induced demand. And just for, you know, the media or any members of the public that might be watching, just to give you an idea of what that means.

And I know Councilor Turner spoke about traditional thinking versus newer thinking that the idea of induced demand is actually really old. People have known about this for a really long time, transportation engineers, economists, city planners have been talking about this for a really long time. It’s the idea that the more road capacity there is or the more road capacity that’s introduced, the more vehicles then go on the road and use the road. There’s been study after study after study in the US in the UK in Japan that has found this phenomenon to be true.

For example, in 2014 in LA, they spent a billion dollars widening a freeway there, the I-405, one year after that construction was complete, traffic was moving more slowly than it was before the project began. More slowly after a billion dollar project, this is what Councilor Helmer talked about about investing this kind of money. We ought to make sure it’s a wise spend. Back in the ’30s, there was a bridge in New York area that had serious congestion on it.

They built new bridges. And not only did cars just block to these new bridges, all three bridges, but at the end of the day, all three bridges were equally congested. So it did not solve the problem. And all of that money was invested in that project.

People wonder, where are the cars now? Why will this bring more cars to the road? Because people landing their transportation and their trips and they are taking trips at off hours, not peak times. Perhaps they’re walking because it’s a short trip, but now with the improved or the increased capacity, oh, I could do this trip in 10 minutes instead of 20, so I’m going to drive.

So they’re bringing more cars to the road. Maybe people are using transit. Maybe people are carpooling. This is where all the pent up demand is in people making different choices rather than driving their single occupant vehicle by themselves.

So the fallout of the pandemic also is seeing people taking different options right now. And we could see this in the future, which will feed into the new mobility master plan. These we’re seeing more working from home, even post-pandemic. A lot of places are talking about condensed hours.

So doing a four-day work week or flexible hours for their staff, a four-day work week for their staff. So some of them are working Monday to Thursday. Some are working Tuesday to Friday or some variation of that. So it’s not the same amount of people driving to the same workplace at the same time as it was pre-pandemic.

So this all goes back to what Deputy Mayor Morgan said about letting the mobility master plan process go through. Let’s identify all of the possible solutions to the congestion that we have on our roads. We’ll identify the pinch points that Councillor Layman brought up. I know whenever we talk about a new project, staff are always saying, well, we would prefer the driveway over here because this is an arterial road and we want to limit the access points on the arterial road.

We should be doing more of that and finding alternative access points for cars to merge into those arterial lanes. And then, of course, I am a big supporter of the intelligent traffic signal system that we approved, that we invested a significant amount of money in. And I would like to see engineering and intelligent traffic signals, the mobility plan, all work together to find efficiency on our roads and the reduction of the greenhouse gas emissions as well. Thank you, Madam Chair.

Thank you, Councillor Cassidy. Councillor Van Merbergen, you had your hand up. Would you like to split out or please proceed? Thank you, Chair.

I just had a couple of more comments if I could. In terms of the pandemic demand, we’re seeing actually just in the last couple of days, BNN Bloomberg released a nationwide survey that was just recently conducted across Canada. And there’s certainly no reason why London would not be in a similar vein to this. But the vast majority, according to the survey, 16% were working from home during the pandemic in the past year.

All but 4% are planning to return to their offices. And the vast preference is to get to work in a private vehicle. So that’s what’s coming down the pike. It’s going to return and increase in terms of vehicle volumes.

And you can see, certainly, as the pandemic hangs around and all these variants are hanging on, and it’s becoming more and more clear that this is going to be with us for some time, that people want the relative safety of their own space. And that’s probably what’s driving a lot of it. But that’s the reality. That’s the reality we’re facing.

Sometimes we get, I think, a little lost in terms of what we wish for and what the public actually wants. And I think we have to be careful with that and focus on what the reality is. When I hear the arguments that, oh, there’s no real gain by widening the road, well, when you employ that logic, it then becomes clearer using that logic that it never should have gone to four lands. It should have stayed at two lands.

Or maybe even better, it shouldn’t be there at all. Clearly, if there’s the demand, which there is, going to six lands is the viable option that makes sense. It’s not unusual for a city the size of London, with over 400,000 people to have a six lane corridor. We just have to look at the cities we compete against, the Hamilton’s, the KWs.

They have six lane arterials. This is not unusual. So I just wanted to make those points. I also want to talk a little bit about the funding.

This has been in the planning stages for so long. And the funding has been contributed throughout the years. And maybe we could hear from somebody in finance, if they’re with us today, or the most appropriate staff person, has the money predominantly been saved through the development charges process? Is that in the bank, so to speak?

To staff for clarification about funding for this project? Yeah, through the chair, I’m sorry. I don’t see we did have some people from finance on the call earlier, but they have left. And beyond saying that the project funding is a combination of development charges and rate funded sources, that’s as far as I can comment with respect to the financing.

The other aspect in terms of the financing, rate payers, residents of London, this is what they expect their taxes to be funneled into, is something that funds basic infrastructure, which of course, transportation is. This is the primary reason that they want to pay their taxes for this type of expenditure. It’s something they’re demanding, something they want. So I think we can try and focus on the total cost and maybe scare some people or whatever.

We know that we’ve been planning this for years and years and years, and the time has come to move forward. By delaying it, of course, as we all know, the price will only go up. Thank you. Thank you.

Seeing other speakers on the list, I will ask the Vice Chair, Councilor Turner, to take the chair for a moment, if I could make some comments? Certainly, Madam Chair, I have you on my speaker’s list. Wonderful. Thank you to committee for this robust discussion, recognizing many speakers spoke multiple times.

It is an important one as it’s the first time that this climate emergency screening tool is being used to a city project and a big one that had been questioned in the past as we saw the multi-year budget and seeing this project always out and looking for an appropriate time to have a full sum discussion, which is what I believe is before us today. For me personally, I’m interested in moving more people, which doesn’t necessarily mean more traffic. Very familiar with induced demand. If you build it, they will come.

And serving people, I’ve given them options to use the methods of transit that we would prefer. We all know that Lennon’s seeing a huge housing boom, and many people coming here from, many from the GTA, and they’re looking to our city services, usually around transit and wondering about the efficiency and reliability of what the city offers. For me, recognizing that all Londoners have an option to get to work or enjoy the city as they would see fit. Not everyone has the financial means to own this personal vehicle that will whisk you away at a moment’s notice as you’re running late and we need to have appropriate road space.

And after transportation networks for people, however they managed to take those trips, having just driven back from up north, it was bumper to bumper on a Thursday midday from berry to Waterloo. As I drive by road expansions, knowing that it’s not going to make a difference. ‘Cause it’s just going to fill in as per the stats that Councillor Cassie gave. Recognizing the city’s budget and development charges to Councillor Halmer’s point, 2.212 million dollars to get an extra couple lanes of traffic for 8.2 kilometers.

And then looking at what it’s going to cost for budgetary constraints and potentially increases for snow removal, road repairs, sanitary work and eventually road replacements is something we need to be mindful for. What Londoners as taxpayers are going to have to hold the burden of those choices that we make before us today, these are going to be longstanding choices. So for me, I am in favor of the staff report and very interested in those ward Councillors who service those areas and knowing the pinch points and how to do traffic management upgrades, some infrastructure improvements around intersections and ways to integrate and act of transportation with the mobility master plan. All conversations I’m very interested in, but for me, the spend of $212 million at this time on this project is something I’m not interested in.

Thank you, Mr. Vice Chair. My comments are concluded. Thank you Madam Chair.

If you’d like to chair back, I will hand it to you. Thank you. Seeing no other city Councillors or visiting Councillors wishing to speak, the motion before us is an A, B and C part. If anyone would like to separate anything out, I’m happy to do so.

Or Councillors are welcome to vote no in the whole parcel. Looking for any comments before I look for a mover and a seconder. Hey, seeing none, looking for a mover and a seconder for item 2.14, moved by Councillor Helmer, seconded by Councillor Cassidy. Hey, the vote will now open in the E-scribe.

Closing the vote, the motion carries five to one. Thank you for that. As we move on to item 2.15, which is the participation in the South London Air Monitoring Network pilot project. This is a resubmission from the last civic work cycle due to getting our administrative items in a row.

This one’s been pulled due to conflict by the Deputy Mayor as a South London Councillor with air monitoring concerns of owners from neighbors. This is a very exciting one that residents have been excited for. So looking for a mover and a seconder in any discussion, moved by Councillor Turner, seconded by Councillor Cassidy. Any discussion on this item?

Councillor Turner. Thanks, Madam Chair. Through you, just to staff, I recognize that there’s a cost associated with this project. We are one of the three, I guess contributors to orders within the community being the W12A Landfill.

The other two are the organic waste processing facilities. Was there any discussion with those organizations to be contributors and to some of the costs associated with this project? Mr. Stanford.

Through the chair, each one of those companies that are strong social environmental and converters, they are installing their own system using the same supplier. So they’re all expanding resources, time and effort and for $1 to join this particular collaboration as is the city of Toronto. So everyone is actually funding the room portion of the project. Thank you.

Perfect. Any other questions or comments from committee? Seeing none, the vote is opening in. East grab having been moved and seconded.

Closing the vote, the motion carries five to zero. Under scheduled items, we have none. And items for direction, we have two, 4.1. The transportation advisory committee would like their feedback to go to civic administration.

That was noted in item 3.2 or their agenda. So I just need a mover and a seconder for that. Moved by Councillor Turner, seconded by Councillor Cassidy. Any questions or comments?

Seeing none, the vote is open in. East grab. Closing the vote, the motion carries six to zero. Thank you for that.

Under items for direction, item 4.2, which is the commercial east scooter in the city of London. All these items are related. One, the public to know there’s nothing before committee right now that deals with the east scooters. This report is going to come back to this committee later in the fall of 2021.

Current public feedback is still being taken at getinvolved.london.ca. And the recommendation from the clerk would be to accept all these communications and have them deferred to the appropriate time when that staff report comes back. So we can talk about delegations and receive their feedback at that time. If that’s acceptable to committee, I would need a mover and a seconder to accept these.

I’m back to the committee later. Thank you to staff for muting yourself, looking to committee, Councillor Cassidy. But it would appear that there is a person in here in the committee that would like to address the committee today. I wonder if we could hear that delegation today and then refer their comments to civic administration as part of their study.

Just one moment, please. Okay, Councillor Cassidy, could you please repeat what you said? So since the person requesting the delegation seems to be here in attendance, I wonder if we could not hear that delegation today and just refer her communication because I believe there’s a written communication as well and refer that to civic administration. But I’ve been informed by the committee clerk that there is three delegations with us today.

So if you would like to do it for one, do you wanna do it for them all? So will, and will there be a public participation meeting at a point in the future? We can defer the question of staff of recognizing the report. We have no report before us right now.

It’s delegations currently not connected to a report on our agenda. Looking for timing of when this comes back and recognizing that the public feedback is still open, does it come back in a public participation meeting or just request for delegation status at that time in the fall to staff for clarification on the process? Madam Chair, I’ll start on Mr. Stanford, may have something to add.

We don’t know what the recommendation of this process is going to be. If we were to implement a by-law that would regulate or allow some use of these devices on our roads or pathways, that would be a by-law change and we would have a PPM. If staff were to recommend not proceeding with any of this, there would be no need for it. We are very much in the collection of information and feedback mode at this point.

So we certainly want to continue to have those conversations. We have received the information from all three delegations and that will be a factor as we go through our review process. I can flip it over to Mr. Stanford who can talk a bit about schedule as well.

Thank you and through the chair. Our get involved site will stay open until September 24th to receive information. We’ve had a lot of stuff just coming at the very end and a couple of delegations today have also forwarded their stuff directly to staff as well. So we look forward to receiving all this information.

We will package it up. We are targeting late this fall. It could be early winter. And the reason is, is that information still continues to be compiled not only locally, but we’re also starting to receive results from what is occurring in some of the public project communities in Ontario, such as Windsor and Ottawa, as well as further information from places like City of Toronto and Montreal.

All communities that have made different kinds of decisions based on the input and on the street experience that they’re having with these scooter programs, as well as bike share this summer. So it’ll be just a little bit longer, but we’re happy to receive any details that are available right now. There is wording prepared. We can certainly receive the delegations today without the reports and knowing direction before us, or we could approve the delegations that they would present to us when this report is also before us.

So there is wording prepared if you want to hear it, but I do see Councillor Turner’s hand up. Councillor CASSIDY don’t mean to cut you off, but if you want to say something, go ahead. And if not, Councillor Turner, you did have your hand raised. Thanks Madam Chair.

I’d move proceeding with the delegations today, as they’re all here. It seems that reading the correspondence, they’re asking for something different than what is before, or will be before Council. The considerations that have come before civic works before with respect to a scooter share and a bike share program. What seems to be asked in the correspondence is so with respect to a by-law that restricts or prohibits the use of these scooters independently outside of a program, and which may actually land in a different committee rather than civic works, seeking by-laws to have those restrictions.

But nonetheless, they’re here. It could be some time before we get to this matter. And at that time, when we do hear the matter, I don’t think it’s with respect to, and perhaps through Madam Chair to staff, to correct me if I’m wrong, but the report will be very specific to those programs rather than the use of those mobility options on our streets in general. Mr.

Chair, if I may, our work, when it does come back, we’ll be dealing with both. It’ll be dealing with an e-scooter share program. And of course, where there are council wishes to proceed on that, as well as potential changes to our existing by-laws, dealing with the personal e-scooters that are on the street. And that’s helpful.

Thank you, Mr. Stanford. Regardless, at this point, it may be helpful to just receive the delegation. So they’ve made the request, and so I would move that.

Okay, is there a seconder for that? Okay, thank you for that. I’ll also draw a committee’s attention then to the Transportation Advisory Committee. They have feedback within their packages as well in regards to e-scooter, which some of the presenters before us today will be contrary to just as advisory committees aren’t here to speak for us.

But as for the delegations, we will proceed then, sorry. We need to vote on receiving the three delegations that are before us, which is 4.2 A, B, and D are with us today. So we need to open the vote in e-scribe to proceed with these delegations. The vote is now open.

Holding the vote, the motion carries, six to zero. I’ll proceed with the progress for delegation status by, as for so being the CNIB Foundation. This is in print within our package for committee members. I will now welcome our guests to speak, realizing you are timed and you have five minutes to share your insights with committee.

Proceed when you’re ready and available. Thank you. Thank you to the Chair in the London Civic Works Committee for the opportunity to speak with you today. My name is Sarah Basso, and I am the coordinator of advocacy and community outreach for the CNIB in Ontario West.

I’m also legally blind, a guide dog user, as well as a white cane user. I’m here to express my professional and personal concern for the potential introduction of e-scooters in the city of London. My position at CNIB requires me to follow the e-scooter pilot projects through the province. As I’m sure many of you are aware, Toronto opted to withdraw from the pilot project.

Earlier this year, after consultations with disability organizations and committees, ultimately deciding that e-scooters provided inadequate safety standards and that there was a lack of protections for pedestrians. In July 2021, CNIB held a focus group for residents of London to voice their concerns over the potential of e-scooters in London. The overwhelming concern was about the added barrier that e-scooters would cause on sidewalks and at street corners. Pedestrians with sight loss were worried that if a pilot project were to go through, the city of London would be adding a barrier to their environment.

Over this past year, streets and sidewalks have been made more difficult to navigate because of patios and directional arrows. I’ve had many personal experiences with e-scooters in the city of Ottawa as a resident. The city of Ottawa has introduced hundreds of e-scooters in the last year, abandoned and improperly parked e-scooters, have caused hazards for me and others daily. Sidewalk riding is difficult to report because solutions for reporting are not accessible.

I’ve had the ability to see what a city with e-scooters deployed and implemented looks like and I respectfully recommend on the behalf of the CNIB that the Civic Works Committee banned e-scooters in all areas of the city of London. The Civic Works Committee has the ability to avoid the safety risks that we’re seeing play out in other cities like Ottawa right now. Should the Civic Works Committee go forward with introducing e-scooters in the city of London against this recommendation, the CNIB has a number of recommendations and considerations that am I protecting those who are blind or partially sighted? These recommendations include but are not limited to, the city of London limiting the speed of e-scooters in parks, on paths and in high pedestrian areas, ensuring the effective enforcement of administrative penalties in case of sidewalk riding and abandoned e-scooters and the process of reporting and fractions should be simple and accessible.

These recommendations, among others, are listed in our report that I submitted to the committee and I encourage the committee to consider this report before any decision is made on e-scooters in the city of London. Thank you for your time. Thank you for your presentation before committee today. Your information is included in our package and in the fall, we can look for the city’s recommendations coming back and we can welcome more feedback when that report comes available.

So thank you for that. Moving on to our second delegation. This is Chris Shafer, vice president, Governor Fairs, for Canada. They are making a presentation virtually to us and are aware that they can submit a presentation with their comments in the fall when this report does come back to committee.

So Chris Shafer, you have five minutes. Please proceed when you’re ready. Thank you, Chair, for permitting me to speak this afternoon. Welcome, I thank you committee members as well.

Just wanted to touch briefly on shared e-scooters. As I mentioned, my name is Chris Shafer. I’m vice president of government affairs at Bird Canada. We are proud to be Canadian owned and operated and we provide shared e-scooter services in a number of cities currently.

In brief, shared or commercially scooter programs exist in hundreds of cities globally, currently. And across Canada, in a number of cities, including Vernon, BC, Calgary, Edmonton, Red Deer, Windsor, Ottawa, et cetera. Other Canadian cities, including Victoria, Richmond’s approved their shared scooter pilot, a program through an RV already. Winnipeg, Mississauga, Brampton, Vaughan, Waterloo region, and Halifax, among others, are at various stages of regulatory development towards potential shared e-scooter programs as well.

In fact, the city of Hamilton just recently approved a commercial shared e-scooter program endorsed by their accessibility advisory committee. It includes a few things, scooter platform visual alert. So these scooters will be required to have a high contrast treatment on the handlebars and the deck of the scooter that helps to visually alert individuals with low vision, acoustic vehicle alerting systems. So e-scooter operators would be required to include specialized equipment or techniques to create a sound to automatically alert pedestrians and our friends in the accessibility community of an approaching e-scooter.

And all these scooters would be required to have a locking mechanism similar to a bike lock and would be required to have riders lock the e-scooter to permitted municipal infrastructure, such as a rack, bike rack, or pole, similar to their existing bike share system. Bird Canada, and I know others in the community, e-scooter community as well, take the concerns of our friends in the accessibility community seriously. I know I’ve spent time in my own position meeting with groups in the accessibility community, including CNIB. A number of things that have come along since e-scooter programs came about about three, four years ago include Braille.

So some cities like Calgary have required shared e-scooters to have Braille to provide customer contact information on the scooter itself. So we do that. Anti sidewalk riding technology, GPS and geofence technology can now slow down and stop a shared e-scooter when riding on a sidewalk. Bird Canada has deployed this technology in Ottawa.

Other parking technologies include the lock two technology I mentioned where you lock it like a bike to permitted municipal infrastructure or camera positioning system to verify vehicle locations. So it’s GPS data is augmented with video captured by riders prior to parking to confirm the vehicle of the e-scooter is parked in an approved area corral, if you like. Geofencing, we use slow down zones to slow the scooter down from the permitted maximum speed, usually 20 kilometers in cities, to a slower speed in highly pedestrianized areas. We create no ride zones where the scooter upon entering that zone slows down and stops safely to prevent riding.

We can layer that with a no park zone. So upon entering that zone, the scooter is unable to be parked. The trip is unable to be ended in that area. We have other features that other companies in the industry have as well such as a beginner mode.

So for safety purposes, the scooter will accelerate at a slower speed for first time riders. There is a feature that is accessible in our app called community mode where people that ride, these scooters are frankly people that don’t in the community but have the app can report issues with an e-scooter. Perhaps if it was locked, if that was the system in London locked to an inappropriate piece of infrastructure that could be reported by all members, including members of the accessibility community through the community mode feature. Other items or features I’ll touch on briefly.

Safe street teams, these are uniform staff members of e-scooter companies and permitted municipalities. Uniformed out daily, patrolling the city, responding to issues in real time if they should develop. 30 seconds. Thank you chair.

Other items include what I would call quote unquote license plates, these are numbers on the scooters that allow for easy tracking and reporting purposes that allow our safe street teams to issue fines, warnings and suspensions rapidly if that is needed on the platform. So I’ll summarize to say we take the concerns of accessibility community seriously. And I believe as I’ve outlined today and in writing to you a number of features help to address those concerns. Thank you for your time today.

Thank you, Mr. Shafer for appearing before a committee and sharing that information on the scooters and their applications in use. Our final delegation today is Delafoski of Ontario’s with Disability After Alliance. There is a communication within our package on page 348 for the public and committee members.

When our guest is ready, please proceed. You have five minutes. Okay, do you want my video on or do you want my video off? That is completely up to you.

Okay, ‘cause as my computer said that I can’t start my video because the host has stopped it. Then verbal is perfect. Okay, very good. Thank you all very much.

That levels the playing field. My name is David Lepofsky, I’m myself and totally blind. I’m a retired lawyer, I’m a visiting law professor at the Osgoode Hall Hospital. I’m chair of the Accessibility for Ontarians with Disabilities Act Alliance.

We’re a nonpartisan coalition that advocates for accessibility for people with all kinds of disabilities. We’ve been in the forefront of combating against electric scooters in Ontario. We’ve been up against a corporate lobby. You just heard from one of the corporate lobbyists who spread extensive disinformation and support of their product.

And you should take their assertions with not a grain, but a truckload of salt. To begin with, right now, electric scooters are presumptively illegal in Ontario. They can only be, you don’t have to pass a by-law to BIM. They are illegal in London, until and unless you pass a by-law to allow them.

And if you do that, you’re taking on the risk that you would be exposing your members of your community to. East scooters present a serious proven danger to injure both the riders and vulnerable people like people with disabilities, seniors, kids and others. This is amply documented and none of the measures that Mr. Shafer presented that supposedly eliminate these risks have been demonstrated to do that at all.

So why should you deal with this now? Not just leave it with staff to figure out what they want to recommend. Well, here’s the situation and I urge you to consider this seriously. People with disabilities are terrified of these, including in your city.

And each time the corporate lobbyists start one of their lobbying feeding frenzies like they did in Toronto, we are all put at risk. And then we have to mount a grassroots campaign like we did in Toronto. We were up against lobbying blitz by the corporate lobbyists that we documented through the Toronto’s lobbying registry that was one of the biggest lobbying blitz going on at City Hall at all. And despite their efforts, what happened was City Council in Toronto unanimously voted to say no because staff doing the most thorough review that we’ve seen done anywhere documented that e-scooters present these dangers to our safety and our accessibility and at the various options to fix them like those Mr.

Shafer just trumpeted. In fact, either don’t work or would inflict significant costs on the city while the e-scooter companies make their money. So they said no, why should you expose Londoners with disabilities? Seniors, parents with little kids to now having to mount the same fight that we had to fight in Toronto.

In the middle of COVID with so much else to do, we asked that you just get this to stop now. It’s not enough to invite people to submit input on a faceless online form for giving input. Most people in London wouldn’t even know that this is an issue or that they’ve got to make submissions. At least if you don’t call a halt to it entirely, which is our first request or recommended city council do that, then we ask that you direct staff to do that which Toronto, the city council in Toronto did, which is to go back and to be sure to investigate the impact on people with disabilities.

People should not be exposed to what Mr. Shafer’s client and others would have, which is uninsured, unlicensed, untrained, novice, motoring it up to 20 plus kilometers an hour on a joy ride silently, which one blind person in Toronto called them, referred to them accurately as a silent menace. To conclude, I want to suggest to you that under the accessibility for Ontarians with Disabilities Act, London is required to become accessible to people with disabilities by 2025. I’d leave it for you to assess how close you are to that goal, but with only three years away, with only three years away, the one thing you can’t afford to do is to make things worse.

Toronto city council learned that allowing e-scooters would make things worse. People with disabilities in Ottawa, who were not protected by their city council, have had things made worse. There it is, I guess. We urge you not to do to those in London, what’s been done to people with disabilities in Ottawa.

We urge you to stand up for people with disabilities and to stand up to the corporate lobbyists. Don’t make us have to go through this fight now. Please let people go back to battling the pandemic and deal with the other challenges they face without needing to take on the corporate lobbyists too. Thank you very much for the chance to speak.

Thank you, Ms. Waboski for being with us today and presenting to committee. For the public’s information and visiting guests, the city does have an accessibility advisory committee that provides notes and wisdom to other committees and council, in which case, certainly scooters would be part of their mandate to provide feedback on. That’s true, and they have recommended that they not be allowed in London.

At this point, we would just vote to receive communications and the delegates that were before us today unless committee has an alternate course they would like to proceed with. Councillor Turner? I’m sorry. No, I’d add to that, that the correspondence and delegation information be referred to as well to that process that’s currently underway.

So, yeah, to refer to staff the information from the delegations. Perfect, the committee clerk is just typing all that up. So I would need a seconder for your motion. Councillor Cassidy will second it and it’ll just be a moment until it’s ready.

Councillor Cassidy, a question. Yeah, I just want to say thank you as well to the delegates for coming and speaking to us today. It’s important for us to get this information. And I would note that I had a telephone call with Cash Hussein who has sat on a few of our advisory committee’s over the years and especially on the accessibility advisory committee and Cash is a visually impaired person and he gave me his insight and input on which is very similar to what we heard today as well.

Saying no further, hands up from committee, the wording is ready and will be provided to you in eScribe. Madam Chair, do you have a Councillor Halmer as his hand up? Sorry, Councillor Halmer. Thank you.

I just wanted to say I appreciate the delegations. I’ve started to dig into the City of Toronto report and had a couple of conversations with our folks who are very concerned about the safety side of eScooters. And I’ve seen them in operation in other cities and I’m pretty worried about the safety risk that people who really can’t hear or see these things are coming to move pretty quickly and they can pop up on sidewalks very easily, especially in congested areas. I’m concerned about how that might roll out.

So I just want to mention that while staff are working through their work on the eScooter pilot. Generally, I like to see different forms of mobility and especially mobility options that don’t generate a lot of fossil fuels adopted in our city and I guess I’m sort of on the fence in terms of how this could be done safely, whether it can be done in a way that’s gonna actually work for people who can’t necessarily see or hear the scooters while they’re moving around. I think all forms of mobility, personal vehicles pose a big risk to people who can’t see or hear those vehicles moving around either. And I think I’ll invite Mr.

Lepofsky and maybe some of the other delegates back the next time we’re talking about building roads without sidewalks, which we are doing right now in the city of London, which is, as I pointed out before, a terrible idea, which we should not repeat. I think the delegates made some really good points that we need to be reminded of sometimes. Thank you for anyone also watching. There’s some great people on social media in cities that have had scooter programs implemented.

I’m certainly following a few in the background just to see as an individual resident their impacts of their daily life and their commutes and their running and enjoyment of strollers and how it affects them. So waiting for the staff report back is I’m also hesitant and open to people’s experience and feedback. So thank you to our guests again today. Look forward to when this comes back for another wholesome discussion and absolutely not convinced to proceed.

So that’s why it’s important that everyone takes time to give feedback and have a voice. E-Scribe is now opening. Please proceed with voting. Councillor Van Meerbergen.

Councillor Van Meerbergen doesn’t show on our screens here. Thank you, ma’am. I think the vote, the motion carries five to zero. Before us today is a deferred matters additional business which is the seventh report, the cycling advisory committee.

They just need committees endorsement to strike a subcommittee to establish in regards to Dundas place traffic diversion. So we’re gonna need a mover to second for that. There are other comments and notes. So Councillor Cassidy will move that.

Councillor Turner will second that. They had also had made public comment on the bike locker pilot project that was being launched in the city of London, just for the public’s awareness that project is up and running. The city did a media release. Councillor Lewis and I practice locking up his bike today.

The project is working perfectly and it is two hours free secure parking. So please come try it out. It’s downtown at Dundas and Wellington, one at Coventry Market, and one by the Williams and Victoria Park. So two hours free, give it a try and 50 cents thereafter.

Shameful plug for the city, but it was great. Any other questions regards to this? Seeing none, your vote is opening an E-scribe. Closing the vote, the motion carries five to zero.

Is the deferred matters list gonna need a mover and a seconder for that or an encore, okay? A mover and Councillor Cassidy, seconder and Councillor Turner. Any questions regards to the list? Perfect, seeing none, the vote’s open.

Closing the vote, the motion carries five to zero. That’s a really good meeting. I’ve enjoyed all our conversation today. If anyone would like to leave us, I will need a mover and a seconder to adjourn.

Councillor Turner, Councillor Cassidy, we’re allowed to do a hand vote of all in favor of parting ways. Okay, we’re good to go. Thank you everyone and enjoy the rest of your day. And for those who have committee later, good luck.