Green Line gets green light from Calgary city council

After spending close to three hours debating behind closed doors on Tuesday, Calgary City Council returned to council chambers and voted to approve the Alberta Government's revision to the Green Line's alignment.

The new alignment, put forward by the Alberta Government late last year, sees the LRT running north from the southeast community of Shepard to the Event Centre in Victoria Park, just north of Stampede Park. From there, the line will run west on an elevated track over 10 Ave. to 2 St. SW, where it will go north into downtown to connect with the LRT tracks on 7 Ave.

“The Green Line is a critical piece of transportation infrastructure and an investment in Canada’s fastest growing city,” said David Duckworth, chief administrative officer. “Today’s decision helps us plan and build for Calgary’s best future”.  

The city says, in a release, shovels beginning construction will go into the ground this year along the southeast alignment with work beginning immediately on the connection into downtown.

The Green Line is the largest infrastructure project, both dollar wise, coming in at more than $6.2 billion, and in physical size.

In a statement, the city said, "Concurrent to construction starting in the southeast, the city will begin work immediately on the functional plan required for the downtown segment to advance design, validate the province’s cost estimates, understand potential impacts to existing infrastructure and engage the public to ensure the project is broadly supported by Calgarians prior to starting construction."

"This work was identified by the province as outstanding and the responsibility of the city to undertake."

The Green Line is funded by the City of Calgary, Alberta Government and Federal Government through the Canada Infrastructure Program.

The next step for approval is for City of Calgary administration to submit a business case to the Alberta Government, which after review, and making any required changes, will forward the document to the feds for approval.

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