Abbotsford British Columbia - The final price tag to widen Highway 11 near the U.S. border and to build an overpass at Vye Road is expected to be more than $20 million higher than first billed.
 
When the project was first announced in 2013, its cost was announced as $25 million, to be split equally three ways between the city, the federal, and provincial governments.
 
The budget increased in 2017 and again last August, when the city revealed that the cost to complete the project had increased by $6 million to $37.3 million.
 
But even that, it turns out, was optimistic.
 
On Monday, council will hear that the project now has a budget of $46.7 million.
 
At that meeting, council is set to finally award the contract to actually start building the project.
 
Construction is now expected to begin early next year, with completion set for late 2022.
 
That's more than a year behind the last schedule posted on the city's website.
 
The city was once supposed to pay about $8.3 million when the project was first announced by municipal, provincial, and federal politicians in 2013.
 
Now seven years later, the city is on the hook for $19.2 million of its final cost.
 
The bulk of that, about $11 million, will come from gas tax money the city receives from senior levels of government for infrastructure projects.
 
Another $6.5 million will come from the city's reserve, while the Southern Railway of BC will chip in $1.45 million towards Abbotsford portion of the bill.
 
The province's share of the cost has also more than doubled, to $18.5 million.
 
Of that, CP will kick in $600,000.
 
When the project was first announced seven years ago, politicians deemed it to be a long-awaited idea whose day had finally come, with MP Ed Fast saying the project had "been sitting there for many, many, years, waiting for the funding to be in place."
 
But in the years that followed, construction stalled due to concerns by CP and Southern Rail.
 
Meanwhile, all those who were party to that original 2013 agreement saw their power wane, then-Mayor Bruce Banman was defeated in 2014, and both the federal Conservatives and provincial BC Liberals also lost power.
 
Despite the cost increases, the federal government is still set to pay the same $8.3 million it promised in 2013, although Transport Canada may provide another half-million dollars through its rail safety improvement program.
 
On Monday, the city will finalize the contract for the designing of the project, including the widening of Highway 11 and the building of the Vye Road overpass.
 
Eurovia British Columbia to complete the work, at a cost of $28.1 million.
 
One other bid came from Peter Kiewit Sons ULC.
 
It was substantially higher, at $40.6 million.
 
The project's total $46.7 million budget also includes $6.6 million to acquire property, $3.5 million for "engineering and management", and $4.2 million to be paid to adjacent railways and "third party utilities."
 
Although the project's budget is set at $46.7 million, the final cost could be less, as that price tag includes $5.9 million contingency fund.
 
Tyler Olsen.