Edmonton council upholds deal to build underground pedway to new highrises

Downtown Edmonton's new city councillor lost her attempt Monday to kill a new $26.5 million underground pedway that is planned to connect a new housing development to the Churchill LRT Station.

Coun. Anne Stevenson presented the motion, but City Council defeated it in a vote of 10-3.

A previous version of council negotiated a deal that would see the city borrow the money and build the tunnel to the Station Lands development owned by Qualico.

City staff predict the investment will be paid back over 20 years through a rise in tax revenues as part of a Community Revitalization Levy.

"I felt that the public benefit that was coming out of this deal, wasn't high enough to warrant supporting the borrowing," Stevenson argued before the vote.

Qualico plans to build 485 rental units in the first phase of Station Lands, which the city said is an investment of $185 million. That phase would be immediately north of EPCOR tower on 101 Street.

Future phases of the project could see more towers built north of the Royal Alberta Museum, in an additional private investment estimated at $657 million.

"This project is going to lead to so many jobs, so much uplift of communities, food on the table, bills being paid, and people actually being able to get through this economic storm," said Coun. Aaron Paquette.

He voted to reaffirm the pedway deal along with Councillors Tim Cartmell, Andrew Knack, Sarah Hamilton, Karen Principe, Jennifer Rice, Erin Rutherford, Ashley Salvador, Keren Tang and Mayor Amarjeet Sohi.

"It's almost like I flip over every rock to make sure that there's not what we might call 'corporate welfare.' This is not that," Paquette argued.

"I'm really concerned that even contemplating going back on this set of decisions, what kind of message that is going to send to (investment) dollars that are very mobile," Cartmell told council.

"We can't just walk away from our end of the bargain at the 11h hour when our partner, in this case Qualico, has been negotiating in good faith. And they have spent millions of dollars on this," Mayor Amarjeet Sohi said.

Councillors Jo-Anne Wright and Michael Janz voted along with Stevenson to have the pedway deal scrapped.

City staff didn't provide a date for when the pedway would be completed, and the CRL deal needs to be signed off by the province before it can happen.

With files from CTV News Edmonton's Touria Izri