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Council moves forward with Edelbrock transit hub

December 17, 2020   ·   0 Comments

By Sam Odrowski

Christmas has come early for the downtown businesses community.

Orangeville Council reversed its decision to build a transit transfer hub on Broadway late last month and approved a motion 4-3 to work with Dufferin County to assess the feasibility and cost for locating the hub at the Edelbrock Centre, during a Council meeting on Monday (Dec. 14).

The reversed decision came after significant opposition was voiced by downtown business owners and Town staff is returning to Council next month with updated costs to locate a transit transfer point at the Edelbrock Centre and relocate the community garden there if needed.

Coun. Todd Taylor voted against Council’s motion to relocate the transit hub, noting that Broadway was selected as the ideal location and building it there is low-cost.

“I think that the location of that [transit transfer] site should be downtown, we’ve spent money as a Town on consultants to come up with that,” said Coun, Taylor.

“The location at the Edelbrock Centre is at least $300,000 plus extra costs here, whereas downtown, as we know, is a nominal fee,” he added.

“I think this is the wrong path in my view.”

As a rebuttal, Mayor Sandy Brown said the Town’s 2016 Transit Optimization Study recommended locating the transit terminal within 150 meters of where the Edelbrock Centre is currently located.

“That’s the geographic centre of Town, that’s the best place to have the most efficient transit system run from,” he remarked.

Mayor Brown also noted that there’s grant funding available to construct the transit terminal at the Edelbrock Centre and it’s a better location for long term transit planning and growth.

“It will be very interesting to hear the cost associated with this and we won’t be voting on this until near the end of January when Mr. Jones brings back a report but I, as you know, firmly believe that the downtown Broadway location is not ideal.”

Coun. Peters responded to Mayor Brown by noting that while the 2016 Transit Optimization Study recommends a transit terminal near the Edelbrock Centre at that time, the most recent transit study, completed this year, shows Broadway as the ideal location.

Nonetheless, the Town is currently looking at cost sharing opportunities with Dufferin County at the Edelbrock Centre for the transit terminal and it plans to begin construction during the building season next year.

An up to date assessment on the costs to build the transit terminal will be provided at Council’s meeting in late January of next year.

The Town successfully secured a federal/provincial grant for Orangeville Transit from the Investing in Canada Infrastructure Program – Public Transit Stream, which covers costs for building a transit transfer point.

The transit terminal project costs approximately $2.1 million, of which the federal government funds 40 per cent and 33.33 per cent is funded by the provincial government. The municipality is covering the remaining 26.67 per cent of the cost.

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