Dr. Paul Cary, a Cambridge family physician and member of the 500- strong highway protest group, Stop the 424 Association, said he remains convinced the current EA (Environmental Assessment) study on a transportation strategy for the Brantford-Cambridge c corridor will eventually result in a new road being built near Sheffield and the Flamborough border. The noise and lights associated with a major highway will affect the quality of life of residents in that part of rural Flamborough, he charged.

While MTO (Ontario Ministry of Transportation) project manager Fred Leech, who is overseeing the transportation study, told a crowd of 400 in Rockton last summer that the new road, if approved, would be a two-lane highway, not four lanes, Cary and many other residents suspect the four-lane option will ultimately become reality. But Leech said last week that things have changed dramatically since the Rockton meeting when the planning process was following guidelines of a Class EA study. “We’re starting off with a clear slate,” he said, noting that in June the MTO decided the most effective way to respond to the comments and concerns of area residents and stakeholders was to proceed with a full EA of the study.

The first stage of a full EA is to come up with terms of reference that will guide the study over the next five years and submit them for public review and comment. The draft terms of reference report was presented to the public at four Public Information Centres (PICs) recently held in Brantford, St. George, Ayr and Cambridge. The meetings were conducted in a drop-in style format with no group presentation or question-and-answer period.

Critical of the format, Cary said it allows officials to talk to people individually or in small groups but doesn’t invite full public discussion. But as the process moves forward, he said there will be opportunities for more input and “people will come out and protest.”

Claiming it was only because residents “did some screaming about the greenbelt” in Flamborough that the MTO altered its study area to exclude the greenbelt and include more land northwest of Brantford, Cary said the recently released draft terms of reference does nothing to allay his fears that a highway will be built along the east side of the study area near St. George and through Puslinch to Highway 401 near Cambridge. “If they abandoned the old one (highway route) because of our arguments, why have they left Puslinch in?” he asked. “If you read the report, it is biased to the east anyway,” he charged.

Leech counters that “there is no pre-determined solution on the transportation facility” that will eventually be recommended by the study. The construction of a new highway has not been recommended at this stage and a number of alternatives are being looked at, including the options of doing nothing or optimizing the current transportation system by widening existing roads.

“Some still think it’s a forgone conclusion that a highway will be built,” he said. But, “It’s not a highway study; it’s an area transportation study,” he stressed.

But Cary questions any study that includes the possibility of building a road through the Galt Paris Moraine, which is the source of drinking water for over 600,000 people in Waterloo Region, Wellington County and Flamborough’s greenbelt areas. He argues that a new highway between Highways 403 and 401 isn’t needed and will destroy prime farmland and wetlands.

Leech encourages area residents to familiarize themselves with the draft terms of reference which can be accessed on the study’s website at www.brantfordcambridge-ea.ca . “Members of the project team encourage stakeholders to review the draft and comment on it,” he said. “We ask them to comment on the specifics of the document rather than what they’ve heard from others.”

Individuals and public agencies are asked to send their comments to projectteam@brantford-cambridgeea.ca or mail them to Project Team Mailbox: Brantford to Cambridge Transportation Corridor EA, c/o TSH, 2000 Argentia Road, Plaza 11, Suite 220, Mississauga, Ontario L5N 1V8 by Friday, November 14.