Ottawa Ontario - The City of Ottawa has asked the federal Liberal government to hold off on considering an appeal over the Prince of Wales Bridge, believing it has a good shot at overturning a repair order in court.
 
The Canadian Transportation Agency last February ordered the city to either discontinue the rail line and bridge or make them ready to use within 12 months of receiving notice.
 
The city thinks the order is baloney.
 
In documents filed in the Federal Court of Appeal on 29 Jun 2018 the city says the CTA doesn't have the power to investigate if a rail line has been discontinued, and even if it does, the agency is exceeding its jurisdiction by "imposing non-existent maintenance standards" on the rail line.
 
Only the federal minister of transport has the power to issue maintenance orders, the city says.
 
There is no hearing date yet at the Federal Court of Appeal.
 
The CTA decision stems from a complaint by a group called Mobility Ottawa Outaouais Systems and Enterprises, or Moose.
 
The group has dreams of creating a regional rail system using the Prince of Wales Bridge as an interprovincial link.
 
After seeing that the city dug up some tracks near Bayview station, Moose claimed the city has discontinued the line.
 
The city had to remove tracks to build the new Bayview O-Train station.
 
The city says it has plans to realign the track.
 
Nothing compels the city under the Railway Act to operate a rail line, or even maintain it in a state of ready-to-use service, the city says in the court filing.
 
Fixing the line for a third-party group, like Moose, would provide a "financial windfall" to a private venture, leaving property taxpayers picking up the tab, the city says.
 
"The decision compels the city to make significant capital expenditures for no current and likely no future value to Ottawa taxpayers," the city says in a notice of appeal.
 
"It is disruptive to municipal planning involving both the city and Gatineau and does not take into account the city's existing efforts to develop a well thought-out, open, comprehensive, and collaborative regional transportation mandate."
 
It would take three years alone to fix the bridge, the city says.
 
Realigning the tracks around Bayview station would take two years.
 
After receiving the CTA order, the city launched a two-pronged strategy to block the decision.
 
The city convinced the court to hear its appeal and asked federal Transport Minister Marc Garneau to bring the matter to cabinet, with hopes the Liberals would quash the CTA order.
 
Now, the city is asking Garneau to suspend the request for cabinet intervention to prevent the possibility of conflicting decisions.
 
If the city doesn't win at court, it will ask Garneau to take the matter up with cabinet, according to the city's legal department.
 
The City of Ottawa owns the historic bridge.
 
It bought the structure and the Trillium Line corridor from Canadian Pacific in 2005 to protect a potential Ottawa-Gatineau rail link in future transit plans.
 
The bridge is also part of the City of Gatineau's recently announced $2.1 billion LRT plan.
 
While the cities collaborate on interprovincial transit, there has been no public discussion about who would pay for the bridge's rehabilitation, expected to be in the tens of millions.
 
The City of Ottawa has its hands full with its own LRT planning.
 
Ottawa will break ground of the second phase of LRT after opening the first phase, scheduled for November.
 
The conversation will then move to the third phase to Kanata and Barrhaven, and possibly the interprovincial transit connection using the Prince of Wales Bridge.
 
The city is currently on the hunt for an engineering consultant to recommend ways to make preventative repairs on the bridge.
 
A request for qualifications asks for firms that can provide professional guidance on the bridge's substructure.
 
According to Alain Gonthier, the city's director of infrastructure services, there isn't a new timeline established to renovate the bridge.
 
"Maintaining this structure aligns with the city's comprehensive asset management program and is being done as part of a regular maintenance program," Gonthier said.
 
Jon Willing.