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CANADA TRANSPORTATION ACT
REVIEW PANEL
BRIEF TO THE:
Ottawa, March 2001
CANADA’S CONSULTING ENGINEERING
INDUSTRY
SUBMITTED BY:.ACEC Brief to the Canada Transportation Act Review Panel
1
The Association of Consulting Engineers of Canada makes this submission on behalf of its 600
member firms and their 48,000 employees working in communities across Canada and in markets
around the world. Our industry’s business involves a vast array of engineering services related
to the built and natural environment. Last year the consulting engineering industry generated
$6.5 billion in revenues of which roughly 30% were earned internationally.
We make this submission to the Canada Transportation Act (CTA) Review Panel based on our
concern for the safety of passengers and vehicles and the economic consequences of travelling
along Canada’s sub-standard National Highway System (NHS). As professional engineers obligated
to protect the public’s health and safety we must add our voice to those of many other concerned
Canadians who over the years have alerted the federal government to the state of our National
Highway System.
Having played a role in the planning, design and development of the NHS we feel that engineering
firms are well placed to advise the government on its current state and the costs to society and
to the Canadian economy of its degradation. The incidence of infrastructure failures and safety
infractions increase when regular maintenance and repairs are not conducted and when the
system is asked to perform beyond its original design requirements or life-cycle expectations.
In the course of your work to date you have received submissions from among others the
Canadian Automobile Association (CAA), the Coalition to Renew Canada’s Infrastructure (CRCI),
the Canadian Trucking Alliance (CTA) and the Infrastructure Council of Manitoba (ICM). You
might also be aware of the work of the Royal Commission on National Passenger Transportation
(1992); the study of Transport Canada Policy Branch – Canada’s National Highway System:
Description; the work of the Council of Ministers Responsible for Transportation and Highway
Safety (1987 and 1997); and the efforts of the Transportation Association of Canada. You will
be aware therefore of the state of play within Canada’s existing highway infrastructure and what
many experts agree is required to fix the problems. All have underscored the need for dramatic
improvements to the existing National Highway System through greater federal funding.
Despite these studies and representations their collective impact on federal decision making is so
far limited to the $600 million committed to the National Highway System in the February, 2000
Budget. This relatively small amount is to be spent over four years beginning in 2002-2003.
This level of funding is clearly and sadly inadequate given the need to spend $17.2 billion to
address the required rehabilitation and redevelopment of the existing infrastructure.
We hope that the work of your review panel will not miss this opportunity to recommend
substantive and structural changes to the way the National Highway System is managed, serviced
and funded..ACEC Brief to the Canada Transportation Act Review Panel
2
Role of the Federal Government
An important first step to this end is to recognize a formal role for the federal government with
respect to the National Highway System in the Canada Transportation Act. It is remarkable that
this critical transportation system, that carries 65% of Canada’s merchandise export trade to the
United States, and 70% of all internal domestic shipments of manufactured goods is not considered
important enough to be included in the federal government’s transportation legislation and
regulations.
National leadership, through the development of a National Highway Policy embodied within the
authority of the Canada Transportation Act, needs to include common highway technical and
safety standards across the country. The current patchwork quilt of standards is neither manageable
nor responsible. It also needs to include a provision to establish a permanently funded program
in order to serve the long-term needs of commerce and the travelling public.
The greatest impediment to safer highways in Canada is the inability of government decision-makers
to decide who is going to pay and by what means for the necessary capital, maintenance
and operating costs. Toll roads are being used in some parts of the country but are not yet as
publicly acceptable in Canada as they are in Europe. Public-private partnerships have begun to
receive limited political favor in Canada but are clearly not the preferred option for most
governments.
Traditional funding mechanisms are slowed and weakened by federal-provincial negotiations and
by conflicting funding priorities of all levels of government in Canada. The current highway
funding mechanisms are not working and continued support for them will only further jeopardize
the state of the national system.
Economic Consequences of Inadequate Levels of Investment
Canada has designated roughly 25,000 kilometers of its 900,000 kilometers of road as the
National Highway System. Of this, only 7,300 kilometers are multi-lane divided highways. Much
of Canada’s existing highway infrastructure was first built in the 1950’s and 1960’s for a population
and an economy much smaller and much less demanding than today. No significant national
highway redevelopment has taken place since the 1960’s in Canada.
Today the NHS is carrying 72 billion Vehicle-kilometers per year. Studies have shown that 38%
of the NHS is below minimum geometric design standard or below the 90 km/h minimum
operating speed standard. Weight, speed, and road design standards vary across the country
from one jurisdiction to another because there is no universal national highway standard. Over
20% of the NHS’s 3,500 bridges require major strengthening or rehabilitation.
In spite of these recognized deficiencies in the quality and capacity of the NHS, the Federal
government’s announced investment of $600 million over four years is the equivalent of $5 per
capita per year. Compare this commitment to that of the United States. Their designated
National Highway System comprises some 255,000 kilometers. The U.S. Federal Government is
currently investing USD$171 billion in the nation’s highways over 6 years, or about USD$110 per
capita per year (over 20 times the rate of investment by the Government of Canada ) ..ACEC Brief to the Canada Transportation Act Review Panel
3
For our highway transportation infrastructure to be competitive with the U.S., Canada will have
to do better or risk losing commercial and tourist traffic to the safer more efficient southern
routes.
We ask the Review Panel to recommend that the federal government allocate a level of financial
support to the maintenance, operation and improvement of the National Highway System including
the Trans Canada Highway comparable to what is being invested in the United States. This
would equate to CDN$3 billion per year. We recommend that these monies should come from
the $4.7 billion gasoline excise tax currently collected by the federal government. This will bring
Canada’s rate of capital investment in highways into the same range as that of other OECD
members.
You will have noted in their submission to this Review the Government of the Province of Nova
Scotia states that between 1988 and 1996 the federal government contributed nothing of the
$8.1 billion invested in highway capital expenditures by provincial and territorial governments.
Today, the federal government is investing about 5% of the total amount of money invested
annually in the National Highway System. Compare this to other OECD countries where national
or federal governments are investing between 31% and 100% of total investments in their
respective National Highway Systems.
Studies predict that through a long-term program committed to eliminating the current $17.2
billion deficit there will be an annual operating cost savings of up to $4.4 billion to the traveling
public.
Better Roads means Better Safety
While significant advances have been made over the past 30 years in improving highway safety
in Canada, we still have 3,000 fatalities per year and 220,000 injuries on our roads. This
progress has been largely made, through driver education, the enforcement of alcohol and seat
belt legislation, and improved crash-resistant vehicles. Seat belt utilization in Canada now stands
at 92%, suggesting that Canada is likely fast approaching the point where further safety
improvements cannot be made solely through driver-behavioral modifications. Canada’s consulting
engineering industry believes that it is time to consider the significant safety benefits to be
achieved by building safer roads and highways, and by employing proven and emerging
technologies - Intelligent Transportation Systems (ITS) - in our vehicles and on our roadways.
Statistics compiled by OECD show that four lane divided highways have a far lower incidence rate
for fatal accidents than do two lane highways. In the USA in 1997, for example, only 12% of the
fatalities occurred on the four lane divided interstate and freeway system, which carried about
40% of the total vehicle-miles traveled. Other roads and highways had a fatality incident rate 4
times higher than the four lane divided highways.
The 1997 Study by Canada’s Council of Ministers Responsible for Transportation and Highway
Safety concluded that 247 lives could be saved and thousands of injuries avoided each year in
Canada by carrying out the recommended $17.2 billion improvement program for the National
Highway System. They also estimated benefits of up to $30 billion would accrue if the improvement
program were implemented..ACEC Brief to the Canada Transportation Act Review Panel
4
Recommendations
Canada’s National Highway System is in a serious state of disrepair due in part to a lack of
adequate capital investment by the federal government. Deterioration of the country’s highway
infrastructure in the face of rising use by Canada’s exporters and the traveling public will put
Canada at an economic disadvantage with respect to international and inter-provincial trade, and
is exposing the traveling public to unnecessary risk. By continuing to ignore the warnings of
numerous citizen groups and the recommendations of the Council of Transportation Ministers,
the federal government is not fulfilling the mandate of the Canada Transport Act to provide
a…“safe, economic, efficient and adequate network of viable and effective transportation services”…
that…“meets the highest practicable safety standards”.
We therefore recommend:
1) That the National Highway System be covered under the Canada Transportation Act;
2) That the federal government show leadership towards the National Highway System
by developing a national highway policy to include mandated national technical
and safety standards (in effect in every other OECD country except Canada);
3) That $3 billion per year be committed by the federal government for highway
maintenance, repair and development to bring the existing system up to modern
day standards;
4) That the requisite funding come from the gasoline excise tax collected by the
federal government ($4.7 billion collected annually by the federal government);
and,
5) That the federal government recognize the National Highway System as critical to
Canada’s economic competitiveness, national unity and quality of life.
Respectfully submitted
The Association of Consulting Engineers of Canada
March, 2001.