A southward expansion of Ottawa’s light-rail transit system that includes a stop at the airport is facing fresh delays, and will not open until November at the earliest.
A public transit official said Wednesday in a memo to Ottawa’s mayor and city council that a date for the opening of the north-south Trillium Line won’t be announced until the project is transferred from the builder to the city.
That handover, which the memo says should happen by the end of the year, is contingent on the completion of testing, regulatory approvals and staff training.
The extended Trillium Line will run south from Bayview Station, which is part of the city’s east-west transit line, past the Ottawa International Airport to Limebank Station near the Riverside South neighbourhood.
The project’s timeline has already dragged for more than a year beyond the August 2022 delivery date in the original contract.
The memo says the eastward extension of the existing Confederation Line is newly delayed to early 2025.
The westward expansion remains nearly a year-and-a-half behind schedule and is expected to open in late 2026.
Both the southward expansion and eastward extension are part of the $4.66-billion second-stage development of the LRT.
The city estimates that a third-stage westward expansion, which has not yet been approved, would carry a price tag of more than $3.5 billion.
A further update on the LRT expansion projects will be provided to council in a subcommittee meeting on Aug. 29.
