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Speech as presented by Richard Begeron at Transport Futures Road Pricing & Leadership Summit, June 18th 2010

Councillors, MPs, city officials, Ladies and Gentlemen, it’s a real pleasure to be here in Toronto with you today. I am honoured to represent the city of Montreal as the leader of the political party I created 6 years ago, Projet Montréal.

Together with other concerned Montrealers, I founded this new party to restore value to the urban way of life in Montreal. Our aim was to stop urban sprawl and our central strategy was to develop a large-scale network of modern tramways while progressively reducing the amount of public space dedicated to private automobiles in our city.

In November of last year, Projet Montréal obtained over 25 per cent of the vote in a three-way race that resulted in the re-election of Gerald Tremblay as mayor of Montreal. After the election, in a move to disassociate himself from his two previous terms, which were overshadowed by scandals, Mayor Tremblay offered Montreal’s two opposition parties an opportunity to join his executive committee. He asked me to be in charge of urban planning and I was glad to accept his offer.

This type of mixed executive committee is a first in Montreal. As City councillor, I’ve had the chance over the past 4 years to appreciate the importance of having a strong opposition at City Hall. Now, I have the somewhat unusual role of trying to make the present administration work effectively as a member of Mayor Tremblay’s executive committee, while at the same time identifying the failings of his administration as leader of an opposition party at City Hall – all the while keeping in mind our goal of winning the mayoralty in 2013.

The subject of this summit is of enormous importance to me. I have studied it and written about it for years, especially in my essay entitled ‘Quebec’s automobile economy’, published in 2003. I’ll come back to it in a moment but first, I would like to give you some background on Montreal.

1.9 million people live on the Island of Montreal and almost half the population of Quebec – 3.8 million people – live in the greater metropolitan area of Montréal.

There are 800 000 vehicles registered on the island of Montreal and 1.4 million in the rest of the metropolitan area, for a total of 2.2 million. Montrealers living in the central neighbourhoods own about 0.6 vehicles per household versus 1.6 for the people living in the far suburbs. And the gap is widening: over the last ten years, the number of vehicles on the island grew by 80 000 units, while it skyrocketed in the rest of the metropolitan region with 325 000 new units. This has put enormous stress on the 13 bridges that link the off-island suburbs with the island of Montreal.

Montreal’s GDP is close to 122 billion dollars or $32 000 per capita. That is low by North American standards. Nonetheless, Montreal offers a great quality of life since it has the lowest cost of living of the sub-continent, especially for housing.

With 500 square kilometres, the island of Montreal represents only 13 % the metropolitan region. The density averages close to 4000 people per square kilometre on the island. It is over three times as high in some of the old neighbourhoods of the core city and almost four times less on the East and West tips of the island, more recently built and typical of the « American Way of Life » .

We have 140 kilometres of highways on the island of Montreal. They fall under the responsibility of Quebec’s Transport Ministry. The subway network is 71 kilometres long and includes 68 stations.

Our suburban train system covers 214 kilometres, with an additional 52 kilometres in the works, under the Metropolitan transportation agency management.

At peak hours, public transit accounts for 35 per cent of motorized trips taken on the island of Montreal, but only 15 per cent in the suburbs off-island. Fully two-thirds of people who travel daily to downtown Montreal do so by public transit.

Montreal has felt the effects of climate change on numerous occasions in recent years. Everybody remembers the ice storm of 1998, when power outages lasted for weeks in some areas of Québec. On a daily basis, we cannot help notice the record low water levels of the Saint Lawrence River nor the deterioration of air quality.

Yet, our city shows a serious public-transit infrastructure deficit. Only 3 new metro stations have been built since 1988. There is still no train linking the city centre to our eastern suburbs and no rail link between the city center and the airport.

On the other side the Quebec Transport Ministry has announced its intention to invest over 5 billion dollars in highways in the central part of the island of Montreal, plus 1 billion dollars planned by both private and public sectors to build 25 000 new parking spaces downtown. People living along these corridors have been very active in fighting these plans for increased car capacity.

These citizens are worried about the impacts the highways will have on their health. They also resent the Ministry’s plans to expropriate hundreds of homes. One of their major concerns is the Turcot Interchange reconstruction project, a huge project.

The City of Montreal has felt these pressures from citizen groups and from our party. Last April, the City took a firm stand against the Ministry’s plan for Turcot and presented a counter-proposal of its own. Unlike the provincial government’s proposal, our plan was designed for a densely populated urban area and is respectful of the residents’ right to remain in their neighbourhoods with a decent quality of life.

For now, let’s talk governance. In Québec, the provincial government is the biggest player when it comes to developing transport infrastructure. I’ve already mentioned the Quebec Ministry of Transport, MTQ. But we also have a provincially appointed Metropolitan Transportation Agency, the AMT. This agency is in charge of suburban commuter trains. It coordinates all transit services in the metropolitan region and studies opportunities for infrastructure development.

The subway and buses on the island of Montreal are operated by the Montreal Transit Corporation (STM), the main transport authority that falls under municipal jurisdiction. Other municipal transit services are operated by our two largest suburbs, Laval (STL) and Longueuil (RTL). All the suburbs of the Montréal metropolitan region also have an Intermunicipal Transit Council (CIT).

Regarding our regulatory framework, the island of Montreal adopted its first Transport Plan in 2008. This master plan lays out the broad orientations for transport development in Montreal. The AMT and the STM each have their own three-year capital works plans as well. On top of all that, the Quebec Transport Ministry adopted in April 2000 a Greater Montreal Area Transportation Management Plan for the development of the region’s road network.

I must tell you that all these levels of jurisdiction and plans create a mess, without real priorities for Montreal and its region. The only two things we all agree about is : one, that we need to generate new sources of funding for our public transport system and ; two, that these new sources have to be feeded by car drivers.

One pressing need is to eliminate a structural deficit in Montreal Transit Corporation operations. That deficit stands at 40 million dollars this year and is expected to rise to 75 million next year. We also need to fund the new transit projects that are part of the city’s transport plan. An additional 240 million dollars a year will be needed to meet this objective over the next 10 years. And that will not suffice to meet our third key: the electrification of the entire transit network by 2026.

This latter goal will receive some financial support from the Quebec government under Premier Charest’s plan to have 20% of all transport electrified by 2020. For example, this plan will cover the additional cost of electric buses. Also, Hydro-Quebec and Renault-Nissan have joined forces under this plan to put 50 fully-electric Nissan LEAF cars on the road through a very popular privately run car-sharing service known as Communauto. New announcements in this direction will follow soon.

Let’s talk about road pricing systems. Montreal once had many road tolls, especially on bridges. The Jacques Cartier Bridge had tolls until 1962, the Champlain Bridge until 1990. Since then, there have been absolutely no tolls in the entire metropolitan area. Tolls will be making a modest comeback soon on a new bridge to Laval that is being built in a public-private partnership. Montreal is also considering tolls for the funding of many of its public transit projects.

Tolls have been a hot topic since last year’s municipal election campaign. The leaders of all three leading parties supported the idea of reinstating tolls on bridges or creating a system of regional tolls. Even leaders from suburbs have said that they would consider tolls if the revenues were not only used for public transit, but also for roads. However, the provincial government has the final word on this type of decision. It has indicated it does not favour tolls – likely a reflection of its desire to pander to voters in swing ridings on Montreal’s north and south shores. At the federal level, our expectations are low as well, since Montreal has no representation in the Conservative caucus.

Since May, however, the provincial government has added a new 1.5-cent per litre tax on gasoline in the Montreal region. The money, 53 million dollars, goes straight to the City of Montreal. Unfortunately, the new revenues will only cover the STM’s structural deficit.

In its last budget, the Quebec government also implemented a new tax on gas in order to pay for its own infrastructure projects. This tax will rise by 1 cent per litre a year, over four years, with an estimated total of 350 million dollars. Only 15 % of the new money will go to investments in transit systems, which means more or less 60 million dollars in 2014,

The City of Montreal also introduced a new tax recently to finance public transport. This tax targets outdoor and underground parking areas in two zones, (A) the central business district and (B) a broader area adjacent to it. It will only generate 20 million dollars a year, but it does have the merit of discouraging people from taking their car to the city centre. It also encourages owners to develop their properties instead of operating them as parking lots. My party, Projet Montreal, would like this tax to cover the entire city. This way, more people would contribute, but at a lower rate. We feel this would be more equitable for businesses and residents in the city centre. The revenues from such a tax would reach approximately 150 million dollars per year.

The debate on transportation is ongoing in Montreal. Other stakeholders include scholars from our five universities, the Board of trade, the trucking industry, large global engineering firms like Dessau and SNC-Lavallin. Bombardier and Alstom are lobbying to get the 4 billion dollar contract to replace metro cars against Spanish company CAF. Community groups fighting for the reduction of car transit have had major support from the Québec public health agency, Montreal regional environmental council, housing rights organisations and from major personalities. It’s impossible to name all the NGO’s active in the field since there are so many; I will only mention Transport 2000, a transit users association and Équiterre, a social and ecological movement lead by former Greenpeace leader Steven Guibault.

In a survey conducted in 2007, 68% of Montrealers and 61% of people living in the suburbs said they were in favour of having tolls on the bridges around the Island of Montreal. When asked about what the revenues from the tolls should be used for, 72% said public transit. Also, 92% said it was important to reduce the use of automobile in order to tackle global warming. These numbers were confirmed in another survey conducted in January 2010.

Of course, business people think that tolls will discourage people to come to the city to eat and shop. The taxi industry thinks any enhancement in public transit is bad for them. Recently, they held a demonstration against the new shuttle bus between the city centre and the airport. Clearly, there is still a great need for education.

Overall, however, the surveys point to a great potential in terms of investments for transportation and the likelihood of a complete transformation of our city based on new public transport infrastructures.

There is a lot of talk these days in Montreal regarding the costs of public transportation systems versus road construction projects. I would now like to talk about the false premises that the media and public administrators commonly use to build their comparisons. Obviously, these cost comparisons should consider not only the infrastructures, but also the cost of energy, the cost of rolling stock as well as operational costs, maintenance costs and garages costs.

They don’t.

When a road building project is presented, typically only the basic infrastructure costs are considered: concrete, asphalt, gravel, lamp posts, road signs, etc. Imagine if we compared public and private transportation costs over 50 years. For road building projects, we would have to include all the costs associated with private automobiles using the road system, their upkeep, their replacement cost after a eight-year lifespan, the cost of gas and the costs of the garages where the automobiles are parked. Does this sound reasonable?

As a rule, as you can see in this slide, only one of the six categories of costs is taken into account. And this table does not even take into account the cost of parking spaces downtown that the cars use during the day.

At first glance, it seems that roads are relatively cheap while public transport requires enormous sums of money. This is because, more often than not, public transport systems are funded through a single source: public funds. But where do public funds come from? They come out of the pockets of taxpayers.

So what I am saying is this: as an elected official, we do need to base our comparisons on the right premises. And fully informed comparisons do not necessarily support investments in the road system – far from it.

As you know, during the thirties, tramways were still the main mode of urban transportation in North America. Consequently, urban areas were small, but densely populated. In less than 20 years, the tramway systems were dismantled throughout North America, thanks to the efforts of the automobile industry. This process is detailed in my latest book, Les Québécois au volant c’est mortel. For example, the GM pavilion at the 1939 New York World’s Fair was very instrumental in promoting a new suburban lifestyle centred around the private automobile. GM even created a new field of engineering to help the cities adapt to the massive use of automobile: transport engineering.

Since this time, city cores have become more and more atrophied. Their decline accelerated when highways were built around them or even through them, giving more and more space to private automobiles. Our cities were devastated by the dramatic increase in the number of cars and the corresponding flight of families and middle classes from the central cores toward the suburbs.

However, some cities have tackled this problem head on in recent years by investing in new Tramway systems. These cities have succeeded in reinventing their public places and creating a urban environment of superior quality. Some of them were even able to reverse urban sprawl. Allow me to dwell a bit on two marvellous examples of this: Paris under the administration of Mayor Bertrand Delanoë, and Bordeaux under the leadership of Alain Juppé.

Paris reduced its automobile traffic by 18% between 2001 and 2007. Mayor Delanoë aims for a 40% drop by 2020. On weekdays, this means 800,000 fewer cars in Paris, compensated by an increase of 1.4 million person trips by public transport, taxi, bicycle, or walking.

For anybody who has visited Paris in the past few decades, the difference is obvious: Paris is no longer a city suffocated by cars. The sidewalks no longer serve as parking lots and on the streets, traffic bottlenecks have largely disappeared.

Reducing the footprint made by private automobiles is the key to restoring the downtown’s quality of life. Alain Juppé is even more strongly committed to this goal in Bordeaux than Delanoë is in Paris.

Mayor Juppé reversed the unhealthy dynamic that was slowly killing Bordeaux to the benefit of surrounding suburbs between 1960 and 1990. Thanks to him, Bordeaux installed a modern tramway in 2003. It was difficult to install the first two lines in the central part of town and local merchants needed to be patient, but today they are reaping the dividends. In barely 10 years, the population of Bordeaux grew by 30,000 residents.

My party proposes the same kind of transformation for Montreal. Tramways and me go a long way back. I just love them and I first advocated bringing them back to Montreal in 2000, while I began working for Montreal’s AMT.

Since then, this idea has come a long way in Montreal. In 2006, Mayor Tremblay discovered new tramways on the “boulevard des Maréchaux” in Paris. He then made them the top priority of the City’s 2008 Transportation Plan. Currently, the implementation of the first two tramway lines is under study with one line making a loop around Old Montreal.

I would now like to describe the extent of my party’s vision regarding the tramway, and the important link with transportation infrastructure financing. After that, I will tell you all about the methods of financing that we propose.

I must say, as a Montrealer, I feel almost embarrassed to be presenting our humble project for a new tramway system. You in Toronto have made historically a much wiser choice maintaining the tramway, and your municipal path. Projet Montréal wants close to 40 kilometres of tramway lines to be built in Montreal over the next 5 years. Considering that tramways cost $40 million per kilometre and the economies of scale that would be incurred, this represents a cost of 1.5 billion dollars.

In the long term, the second phase we envision would cover another 100 kilometres and connect all the neighbourhoods of Montreal together with the south shore. Within that phase, the most important line would be the one following Notre-Dame street in the eastern part of the Island, along the Saint-Lawrence River.

Right now, the Port of Montreal uses the shores for dumping bulk products or as storage space, and long term parking space for abandoned boats. In between the shore and the boulevard, there is a large marshalling yard that the shipping companies use to assemble kilometre-long trains before they leave the city. The barrier created by the port and the trucking activity it generates has led the provincial government to plan a large 8-lane open trench highway separating historically poor, working-class neighbourhoods from the river.

We have a much different vision for the city – one that would use public transportation infrastructure in order to kick-start the revival of these neighbourhoods. The street could be kept as a small boulevard with plantings. This project could integrate the tramway and the rebuilding of a harbour front that could eventually become home to thousands of families. This is part of Projet Montréal’s strategy to have 80 per cent of new houses built in the city instead of in the suburbs.

Toronto’s Waterfront projects are an inspiration for us, and we are excited to hear that the Gardiner Expressway will be torn down in order to reconnect with the shores of Lake Ontario. In Montreal, it seems we are two steps behind. We try to tell the Quebec government: “don’t build this new Gardiner Expressway that will keep us away from the Saint-Lawrence river shores”. It’s not an easy task, but sooner or later, I think people will look at this differently.

As you can see, we have large-scale projects for public transportation and development on the waterfront. And of course, we have a large-scale agenda to finance such projects. Before describing it, let me give you some context so that you will not be scared of the evil and extreme taxing scheme we have thought about.

Basically, there are four important road pricing schemes to choose from:

The first one is tolls. As I mention before, it’s the Government of Quebec who can make the decision to install the new tolls, and he will not do it. Montreal is looking further into the idea of a regional toll that would be implemented by the metropolitan community. Preliminary estimates indicate a potential of about $425 million per year, 200 of which would be allocated to the implementation of Montreal’s Transport Plan.

Gas taxes, the second road pricing scheme, have many advantages: it is very easy to implement, at no cost; payments vary according to the kind of vehicle one drives and to the distance one covers, following the pay-as-you-pollute principle; after a while, the tax becomes invisible, since it is hidden in the global price of gas, which itself fluctuates daily. The 1.5 cents that was introduced in Montreal this year only generated revenues of $53 million. We would need an additional 9 cents per litre to meet the needs detailed in the Transport plan.

Parking taxes are relatively more difficult to implement. It forces the administration to maintain an inventory of all the parking spaces in order to tax it properly. It is also the most difficult in terms of logistics, since the city has to deal with each owner independently. Owners could easily split their parking to fall under the exemption threshold, leading to tax fraud problems.

The fourth scheme, distance or odometer tax, looks easy to implement at the first glance. But in fact, odometers can be tempered with. Technologies like GPS do raise some privacy problems, although they are used to tax the trucking industry in Switzerland. Installing GPS’s in all passenger cars and keeping records of a person’s movements could be perceived as invading privacy.

What you need to remember from this presentation is that in terms of transport, there is a gap between the provincial government priorities and the city of Montreal. This is why Montreal is looking for ways to finance new developments in public transportation, at the rate of 250 million dollars per year, and will consider all options, tolls included. Will it reintroduce tolls on bridges or regional tolls? Will it expand the parking tax to the island, or to the region? We are very serious in our will to transform our streets and committed to find ways to realize our vision.

As we saw, Toronto, Vancouver, New York and Oregon are doing fine, but keep an eye on us: we are also in the race for urban quality of life.

Thank you.