A federal announcement Tuesday was a breath of fresh air for Caswell Hill residents. The area is the current home of the city’s bus barn, but that’s going to change.
The federal government announced a $43 million investment into a new facility in a new location near the landfill. The new funds cover roughly a quarter of the $128 million phase one cost of the new building. The rest of the funding will be split between the public and private sectors, with city covering construction and maintenance cost to a private partner for the next 25 years. After that, those responsibilities will be handed back to the city.
“People have asked for a long time for the bus barn to be moved, for the maintenance building to be removed from this area,” Mayor Don Atchison said.
The new transit hub is just one part of the future civic operations centre. There two phase project is going to be located off Valley Road. According to the mayor, the new facility will make the city’s transit system more efficient.
“With Circle Drive South being finished later this year, our buses are going to be able to move in a more circular manner, and they’re going to be able to get to new areas quicker,” he said.
The city said construction of the centre should start in early 2015, with most of it expected to be done by late 2016.
