B.C.’s multibillion-dollar Pacific Gateway arrives at a major milestone in December.
That’s when final touches will be applied to the $1.3 billion, 40-kilometre South Fraser Perimeter Road, one of the critical pieces of infrastructure supporting national efforts to ease goods movement through Canada’s largest port and expand trade relationships with nations in Asia.
The four-lane expressway follows the South Arm of the Fraser River northeast from Deltaport through Surrey to connect traffic to 176th Street – the primary conduit for the Pacific Highway border crossing for trucks – as well as Highways 1, 91, 99 and the Golden Ears Bridge to Maple Ridge and the Lougheed Highway.
At a local level it will reduce traffic bottlenecks in Delta around a bustling container port that already handles 3,000 trucks a day. But it’s only one increment of what’s needed to fully realize Gateway.
Since 2005, $22 billion has been committed by private and public sector Gateway partners to finance projects such as expansion of Vancouver International Airport, upgrading the Port Mann Bridge and Cape Horn Interchange, expanding rail and port capacity in Metro, and establishing a container port at Prince Rupert.
Last year, Christy Clark’s Liberals advised that Gateway would need a further $25 billion worth of infrastructure investment. The investment includes at least 18 infrastructure projects – such as a $2 billion doubling of terminal capacity at Deltaport and development of liquefied natural gas export terminals on B.C.’s north coast.
Beyond those projects is a similarly extensive list of what the Asia Pacific Foundation calls “softer” initiatives aimed at fostering stronger economic and trade ties with Asian partners, including China, Japan, Malaysia and South Korea.
Amid all of this, the South Fraser Perimeter Road is considered a cornerstone, particularly for a B.C. trucking industry that desperately wanted a more efficient route in and out of Deltaport. The plan by Deltaport operator TSI Terminal Systems Inc. to double container capacity at Roberts Bank, for example, would be premature without the greater road capacity the South Fraser expressway creates.
“The completion of the South Fraser Perimeter Road is a major component of the transportation system we have been seeking since the 1990s,” said Bob Wilds, managing director of Greater Vancouver Gateway Council. “It’s a key component of the transportation grid we need for goods movement.”
The council was formed in 1994, initially to work out the logistics of handling more container traffic at Deltaport on behalf of western provinces and Transport Canada. Then as now, the Gateway project was intended to operate as a national enterprise, Wilds said.
One of the major strategic initiatives has been obtaining support from Tsawwassen First Nation (TFN). As a result of a treaty the TFN signed in 2009, the native band became significant landholders in the immediate vicinity of Deltaport.
Chris Hartman, the band’s economic development office CEO, said it has 70 acres of industrial-zoned land under negotiation for activities supporting Gateway.
In September 2013, International Trade Minister Ed Fast announced $50 million in federal funding for a container inspection facility that will be built on TFN land.
“Let’s face it, the South Fraser Perimeter Road is a game changer in terms of how industrial lands will be developed and serviced in the Lower Mainland for the next generation,” Hartman said. “For us, it establishes our lands at Mile Zero of the transportation network, not only in the Lower Mainland but across Canada.”
Louise Yako, president and CEO of the BC Trucking Association, sees South Fraser, Port Mann and Highway 1 widening in Surrey and Langley as components creating “a lot more fluidity” for truck movement.
Yako said she agrees with urban planner and public transit advocate Gordon Price that it’s impossible to “build yourself” out of a traffic problem.
“After this I don’t know that infrastructure capacity or infrastructure improvements are going to be helping the industry,” Yako said.
Instead, “it’s a whole series of policy issues and probably some community issues in terms of how our industry can become more productive and make use of the infrastructure that we have.”
The regional road improvements – and here is a part of the story that’s often overlooked – make trucking a more attractive industry for young workers. Fewer traffic delays mean drivers can make more runs, and more money, per day, with less frustration. In an industry where drivers average 46 years of age, five years older than the national average, and 26% of drivers are over 55, better roads make them more competitive for young workers.
“Infrastructure is key” for Eva Busza, vice-president for knowledge and research at Asia Pacific Foundation, but it involves more than hard assets such as roads and bridges.
“It’s ensuring that we have the right skills, the labour force, the customs procedures, the logistical expertise, the legal expertise. All of these sets of skills and industries are necessary for that hard infrastructure to be as efficient, as effective, and as attractive, to traders both on this side of the continent and in Asia.”
“A final element, and this is in some ways the most challenging part, is that there have to be the goods to transport.
“That requires us accelerating the kind of trade agreements we have with Asia, to ensure there’s more movement of imports and exports.”
B.C. Transportation Minister Todd Stone is looking forward to the official opening of South Fraser in the near future, “certainly on this side of Christmas.”
“It’s going to remove a whole bunch of commercial trucks off of what are really side roads in Delta today, which is good for the local communities in terms of congestion, emissions and so forth,” Stone said.
In early October, Stone embarked on a tour of communities around the province to emphasize the value of Gateway to the provincial economy. A lot of British Columbians, he said, do not yet understand its long-term significance.
“We really want to make sure British Columbians understand the connection among all of these major infrastructure investments and their quality of life. It’s about opening up markets in Asia and moving our goods and people more efficiently, and creating jobs and all the rest of it.
“We also made significant investments in four-laning the Trans-Canada from Kamloops to the Alberta border and we are continuing with that, [and with] the Cariboo Connector from Cache Creek to Prince George. We’re halfway through a $440 million upgrade of that corridor. It’s all part of the Pacific Gateway transportation strategy.”
