The parking garage spanning the O-Train tracks will cost $9 million more than previously anticipated, according to Carleton’s vice-president (finance) Duncan Watt.
A motion introduced at the Nov. 28 Board of Governors meeting extended extra money to the garage’s previous $25 million budget, bringing the project to a total of $34 million.
Watt said there were two reasons for going over budget.
Construction was supposed to begin May 1, the day the city closed the O-Train to expand the line, but delays getting appropriate permits from the city meant construction didn’t start until the end of May. When the O-Train fired up Sept. 1, Watt said Carleton paid to halt O-Train service on weekends to continue construction.
This and a hidden aquifer near the construction site meant they went over budget.
“It’s a bit of an unusual project,” said Darryl Boyce, assistant vice-president (facilities management and planning).
He said the project required the expense of buying air rights from the City of Ottawa for building over the O-Train tracks.
However, Boyce said buying air rights is a “sustainable approach” for the university.
“You’re not using up land that could otherwise be green space or a building or some other service for the community,” he said.
The entire price tag for the 3,600-spot parking facility will come from Parking Services, an ancillary operation at Carleton.
This means all salaries, operations, expenditures, and maintenance are funded solely through funds raised by Parking Services through permit sales, visitor parking revenue, locker rentals, and parking fines, according to Brian Billings, assistant director of Parking Services.
At the Board of Governors meeting, Watt said the Parking Services budget could afford the $9 million cost overrun.
Between the 2011-12 and 2012-13 budgets, Parking Services’ revenue rose from about $4.3 to $4.5 million.
Two-thirds of this increase came from approximately $150,000 more in parking permit revenue. An additional quarter of the increase came from higher revenue in cash parking.
The garage construction has affected students who park in neighbouring lots.
Permit-holders for P7, which holds about 700 parking spaces, received an email from Parking Services mid-October telling them the lot would be closed until December.
They were told they could park in neighbouring P6 during construction and, if the lot was full, they could park in P5 near athletics after 2 p.m. If P6 was full before then, they were out of luck.
“I guess it is a solution, but it’s more of a rainy day solution and not a permanent solution,” said Tyler Smith, a fourth-year computer systems student who parks in P6.
In their email, Parking Services said they had done numerous daily parking space counts and had noticed spots available to park. They said they did not see a need for the overflow lot to be available before 2 p.m.
Smith said he’s had difficulty finding spots in the busy morning rush.
Boyce said the university is trying to accommodate students’ parking needs during the construction and the reduced parking was an obvious and unavoidable problem.
“There’s a short term problem for a long term gain,” he said.
The garage is expected to be open by June 2014, with P7 operational by the end of December 2013, Boyce said. However, he said the debt incurred from the project will take decades to pay off.
