Taxpayers Won’t Foot Bill For Rail Trail Construction

Mar 25, 2019 | 6:00 AM

Local politicians have set some early guidelines for developing the proposed North Okanagan Shuswap rail trail between Armstrong and Sicamous.

The Regional District of North Okanagan board says the construction cost has to come from fundraising and grants, not from tax dollars.

“The entire group, right from Armstrong to Salmon Arm and Sicamous, we’re all in consensus for all of those policies and procedures that we put in place,” says RDNO chair Kevin Acton.

The district earlier teamed up with the Columbia Shuswap Regional District and the BC government to buy the former rail line from Canadian Pacific, each providing $2.17 million of the $6.5 million cost.

“We’re not going to expect the taxpayers to fork out money to develop the trail,” Acton tells Beach Radio News.

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The committee overseeing the trail has been given an estimate of $12.9 million to construct the 50 kilometre multi-use path and all the associated costs.

The board also supports not starting trail construction until funding has been secured for minimum base standards.

“There is a few difference between this one and the other one (Okanagan Rail Trail between Coldstream and Kelowna). This one has a lot of opportunities for agreements on it, to create some funds through revenue generation, so there will be some money coming from that to put people in place to help with the fundraising of the organization.”

Acton says the idea to is to initially build the entire trail to a base level.

“And then from there, people can pave it or bring it up to a different standard if they like.”

Acton says the estimate cost is between 8 and 12 million dollars.

“There is some work to do on culverting and on highway crossings that could be a little more or less expensive.”

Acton, who is Lumby’s mayor, expects a non profit group to spearhead the fundraising, similar to what was done with the Okanagan Rail Trail.

by Corey Fischer