As I've predicted numerous times in this thread, the environmental cleanup talk begins:
http://calgaryherald.com/news/local-...es-arena-plans
Quote:
“There’s a reason there’s nothing built on that site. It is deeply, environmentally contaminated. I’ve been concerned for some time about the creosote contamination on that site and how the province, the city and the former owner are not doing enough to clean it up.
“But if this leads us to have a broader conversation about the need to clean up this site, that’s a good thing.”
Nenshi added he’s especially concerned about reports as recently as last year that homes across the river were found to have creosote in their basements, and that creosote may still be leaking from the land into the river basin and travelling across.
“This has increasingly shown up on my radar over the course of the last year, ever since we heard about the creosote potentially travelling across the river.”
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Quote:
But Nenshi said Thursday that before any development can occur, it’s time all three levels of government have a broader conversation about how to clean up the contamination.
“The cleanup costs of that site would be enormous, so we have to figure out how to pay for it.
“We need to have a national conversation around brownfield sites and figure out what’s the role of the industry that caused the pollution, what’s the role of the federal and provincial governments. But certainly dumping it on municipalities is not going to work.”
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A lot of money that needs to be spent no matter what gets built on the land, and now that there's evidence that creosote is leaking across the river, the timeline is more important.