SIERRA CLUB DISPUTES NEED FOR DRIC

For Immediate Release: January 26, 2011

SIERRA CLUB DISPUTES NEED FOR DRIC

Sierra Club Ontario today released an Econometric Research Limited (ERL) study that presents and evaluates the projections relied upon to justify the construction of Detroit River International Crossing, referred to as the DRIC. The DRIC project is a proposal to build a new vehicular bridge connecting the cities of Windsor and Detroit, despite this area already being serviced by the existing Windsor-Detroit Tunnel, Ambassador Bridge and Windsor Ferry.  The cost of DRIC is expected to exceed $5 Billion and the Federal government has recently promised $550 Million to the Michigan government to cover a portion of Michigan’s cost of constructing the DRIC.  The Government of Ontario has also committed $1.6 billion to construct the Windsor-Essex Parkway (WEP) as the Ontario connection to DRIC.

Dr. Atif Kubursi, Professor of Economics, McMaster University and President of ERL evaluated the Wilbur Smith Associates (WSA) report that is used as the basis for the justification that the DRIC is needed.  Dr. Kubursi finds that WSA’s conclusions are flawed in assuming that recent traffic declines are only a minor interruption to the growth of cross-border traffic.  Dr. Kubursi criticized the WSA report as “an attempt…to rationalize an investment of several billions of dollars in a new crossing that is anchored on optimistic forecasts of crossing volumes in the frontier region. The WSA forecast ignores the serious structural changes of the decade of 2000-2010…”  The ERL report notes such factors as9/11, increased border security, the passport requirement coupled with the ongoing recession as just some of the reasons for the continuing decline in cross-border traffic that began in 1999.

Sierra Club Ontario Director Dan McDermott addressed the environmental cost of DRIC, noting that WEP construction would damage the Ojibway Complex, Canada’s largest remaining tall grass prairie ecosystem and threaten at least eight Species at Risk. The Ontario Government justifies this environmental cost by touting the “economic and social benefits” achieved by the project. Mr. McDermott said today that “In the Sierra Club report we present today Dr. Kubursi and his team have exposed DRIC as an answer in search of a question”.  He went on to note that “It defies logic that the McGuinty Government would join with the Government of Canada in spending billions of our tax dollars to service a declining cross border traffic demand at significant environmental cost”.

An important part of the environmental cost of DRIC is the damage that would result to Ojibway and the species that live there. Dr. Robert Murphy is a herpetologist affiliated with the University of Toronto and Senior Curator at the Royal Ontario Museum. Dr. Murphy today spoke of the impact that WEP would have on Ojibway’s endangered and threatened snake species and the inadequacy of the government’s proposed mitigation plans.

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For further information: Dan McDermott 647-345-7665, (cell) 416-873-3852, dmcd@sierraclub.ca