http://www.thedailyobserver.ca/2016/07/13/county-to-meet-charelli-over-highway-17

County to meet Charelli over Highway 17

By Sean Chase, The Daily Observer

Wednesday, July 13, 2016 12:53:30 EDT PM

PETAWAWA - With Bob Charelli now in charge of directing infrastructure dollars, Bob Sweet is hoping to once more pitch expanding Highway 17 to four lanes.

The Petawawa mayor said Monday the County of Renfrew plans to send a delegation to meet with the new infrastructure minister during the annual Association of Municipalities of Ontario conference scheduled for August in Windsor.

Charelli, the MPP for Ottawa West-Nepean, was shifted to the infrastructure portfolio following Premier Kathleen Wynne’s June cabinet shuffle. The Ministry of Infrastructure is now a stand-alone ministry, responsible for the implementation of the Liberal government’s $160 billion investment in roads, bridges, schools and hospitals.

According to Sweet, Charelli is no stranger to the Highway 17 file. It was Charelli who requested the county prepare a business case outlining the merits of expanding Highway 17 to four lanes between Arnprior and Mattawa. In recent months, Sweet has stated the project should become a national undertaking with funding coming from Ottawa.

“This is the Trans-Canada Highway,” he said. “We’re not giving up. We have to move this ahead. We’re keeping up pressure on both the provincial government and the federal government for funding.”

The pace of the project is slow at best. The current phase of the Highway 17 four-laning project, the twinning from Campbell Drive to Scheel Drive west of Arnprior, is slated to be completed this year. The third phase, from Scheel Drive to Bruce Street at Renfrew, is on the province's long-term capital projects list for some time after 2018, yet no capital funding has been committed from Queen’s Park.

Councillor Treena Lemay said that she will be able to provide recent data compiled by the SAFE on 17 Facebook page that will be part of the presentation. Meanwhile, the town will continue to lobby the province to leap frog the Renfrew to Pembroke phase, where land acquisition and engineering needs to be completed, and begin four-lane construction from Meath Hill to Chalk River, as most of the land has already been acquired. Last year, County council voted down a Petawawa resolution calling for the start of a west to east expansion.

“I’m still of that opinion but I don’t have the support of all of County council,” said Sweet.
The province might also see an urgency in expanding Highway 17 as a critical route to move shipments from the Ring of Fire, a massive planned chromite mining and smelting development project in the mineral-rich James Bay Lowlands. In any event, Sweet said they must hammer home the need to enhance the highway as a means of economic development with the absence of the Canadian Pacific Railway.

“Roads are built for economic development and without the roads we are going to be in the wilderness for years,” he added. “This is our bloodline. This is the 21st century and you have be able to ship your goods to market.”