After a heated debate at city hall Tuesday, city council approved two proposed LRT routes.
The west route will run down Stony Plain Road to 156 St. before veering south to 87th Ave.
The other route on the city's south side would take about 19 minutes to get from Mill Woods to downtown. The leg is planned to go through the Bonnie Doon area and down by the Muttart Conservatory.
Council debated for hours over whether the west leg of the LRT should take a different route.
"There was difference of opinion on council as to what we should do, but we need to move on, we are never going to find a route that everyone is going to be happy with," said Mayor Stephen Mandel.
Business owners argued that the west route should bypass Stony Plain Road.
"It's a really busy street already, and this is our biggest concern. With four lanes of traffic it's already congested all the time," said Dennis Aronyk, owner of Revolution Cycle.
And it was those concerns that had four councillors vote against the plan. Coun. Linda Sloan was searching for more information about whether the Stony Plain route was the best option.
"I can only vote on my own conscience and I didn't feel I had enough information to determine the risk."
Now that the routes have council's approval, the next challenge will be to find funding.
"The next step is to meet with the province and talk to them about funding," said Mandel.
The lines are expected to cost about $1.2 billion each. Mandel said the LRT expansion is part of a 30-year plan but he hopes that both the west and southeast LRT lines will be built long before that.
With files from Sonia Sunger
