As Parliamentarians return to Ottawa to continue addressing pressing issues facing the nation, two important facts should be considered:
- Recent supply chain challenges have not resulted from a lack of container terminal capacity.
- As we build back better, public money should not be deployed on projects that will crowd out private sector investment that will achieve the same objectives.
Current supply chain challenges are a priority for governments, but West Coast container terminal capacity has NOT been a part of that problem. The fact is, Canada has plenty of container terminal capacity to meet current demands and BC’s container terminal operators, and the hardworking women and men of the supply chain, have been delivering.
While Canada’s West Coast will eventually need additional container terminal capacity, that will be well into the 2030s at the earliest. And, there is a private-sector solution to meet that need: GCT Global Container Terminals, the current operator of Deltaport, is proposing an incremental, smart, market-driven expansion that would add up to 2 million TEUs of container capacity. GCTs privately-funded, environmentally-conscious Deltaport Berth 4 (DP4) project won’t burden the economy, taxpayers, or the environment.
In an effort to continue advancing its flawed Roberts Bank Terminal 2 (RBT2) project, the Port of Vancouver is ignoring these facts and is suggesting that a lack of container terminal capacity has been causing delays in getting goods to market. The Port’s RBT2, a $3.5 billion (!!!) taxpayer-backed mega-project, would build a massive artificial island in the ecologically sensitive Salish Sea, devastating the economy and the environment.
Instead, public money would be better spent on upgrading Canada’s Pacific Gateway with projects that make it (and the supply chain) more resilient and sustainable in the face of climate change. Imagine the road, rail, public transit, and other infrastructure improvements that could be made with $3.5 billion…
There is time to make the right decisions; there is time to #RejectRBT2 and #BuildBackBetter with GCT’s Deltaport Berth 4.
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