Thank you Mr. Chairman. I would like to speak as the Minister of Transportation, and I really want to speak as a MLA for Nahendeh, but I protect my constituency like everybody else does. I want to speak as the Minister of Transportation.
Listening to the debate here, the concern here is that there was $650,000, a new project to the Fort Simpson access, paving. That is what the Member is having a problem with in the Department of Transportation. So let us address it. The Department of Transportation in the other parts of this document here, Changes to the Capital Plan, aside from this, I will speak on the $650,000 later on.
Aside from that, all the other changes are normal practice. I think I hear what the Members are saying. This is a new process that we all started on about ten months ago. I agree. Yes, we are doing something different. On this side, it is something different, we have to learn as we go along. The process here is still evolving. And I agree that, yes, there should be some sort of way, that whenever changes are made, that the ordinary Members get notified. I agree that perhaps like the Finance Minister said, there is a fault in this whole process. I think that is what it is. We have to communicate more. I think that if the changes were made, if you understand them, if you get it explained very carefully, then you would understand the reasoning behind all these things. As Ministers we are busy doing a lot of other things too. We are not only concentrating on shifting money. We are concentrating on doing a heck of a lot more.
As the Department of Transportation, we are responsible for about 2,200 kilometres of road, 52 airports, we are doing access roads, we are doing wharfs, we are doing a heck of a lot more. This is just a very small part of the whole operation. The way money got shifted around from one project to another, the experts are telling me that it is a normal practice of doing business. There are some business people that are here. They know that sometimes you have to make decisions. If you have to check with every person in the whole system, before you make a move, sometimes you have to make a move. But I agree that the MLAs should be informed that whenever there are changes made, then they should be notified. Perhaps that is the faultiness in this whole system.
I think there was a specific question asked by Mr. Ootes, in regards to the Tembind process that was going on into Cambridge Bay. There was a small amount that was moved into that area. I just want to say that this $135,000 that is there identified as a new project. Ninety of it came from the Kugluktuk airport upgrading, and 45 came from the Resolute Bay airport terminal building. This particular Tembind is a chemical that has a binding property in there that binds the material on the gravel surface airstrip. These loose stones, if they are not combined, cause a lot of damage to the aircraft's undercarriage and engines. As a result of that, this application of Tembind is a pilot project for the product at the Cambridge Bay airport where they have scheduled jet service. This application will allow the department to evaluate the product's dust suppression characteristics and its ability to enhance the binding characteristics of the crushed material.
I just wanted to further add that our original plan was to apply this Tembind to the Kugluktuk air side surfaces as part of the rehabilitation work that is currently underway. With NWT Air cancelling their jet service to Kugluktuk, effective May 31, 1993, the department would like to move this Tembind product to Cambridge Bay. The reasons we would like to change side is that we can test this product at an airport which is currently receiving jet service, to see if it is feasible here. We have a test site of the Tembind at the airport serviced by the turbo prop aircraft at Arviat as well. I think this answers the specific question that Mr. Ootes was asking, is that, the airport upgrading in Kugluktuk lost $90,000. We moved it to Cambridge Bay, and we put in some $45,000 from the Resolute airport terminal building, to make it $135,000. This is to test this chemical where there is jet service. Originally, we were going to do it in Kugluktuk, but they cancelled the jet service there, so we are doing it in Cambridge Bay. So that is the explanation for that one.
Like I said, if we go through this whole process, you will understand the reasoning behind it. I think that I have met with Mr. Barnabas on this airport terminal building in Resolute. I think we have come to a good understanding of the reasoning behind it. And we could do that right down the line here.
As for the Fort Simpson access paving, this $650,000 came from Highway 1, that was supposed to have been second stage paving, but we took the money from there, we also put some more money in the major culvert replacement from that money that we took from that paving and yes it is a new, looks new on the new project, but it has been in the plans for some time here but it was not on the five year capital plan.
I just want to say, as well, specifically, that this one here is the project where the community of Fort Simpson had written to the Department expressing concerns regarding the safety of vehicles and pedestrians on this three kilometres long gravel section. The traffic volume on this section is high compared to other highways in the Northwest Territories and there is also a very high volume of pedestrians and bicycle traffic on this area here. This road is very narrow, and gravel surface, and the dust control is applied on this section, but it demands a very high maintenance due to the traffic and the nature of the material that is in it, and I just want to add that there are a lot of people that have been living in that area.
Over 235 units are in that area and this section of the community is growing and the justification for approving this access paving is for safety reasons and the plan for this current year was to do this three kilometres to this, Wildrose Acres, that is the name of the residential subdivision outside the built up area of Fort Simpson and like I said the main reasoning behind this is for safety reasons and I just also want to add that the Department allocates this capital funding for programs based generally on the level of base funding transferred from the federal government for these programs and there is an order of priorities and the priorities are first the rehabilitational replacing of existing facilities, upgrading of existing infrastructure to standard, and of course, constructing new facilities.
Within this highway program the priorities are based on the analysis conducted, the objectives set out and the number of strategies that we have been able to update through the years.
Mr. Chairman, in the overall general discussion that is going on here I agree that there are some things that jump out at you and I do not blame the different members for zeroing in on this and it is a concern, and the process, if that is the case then perhaps we should deal with it somehow and if there is some real specific problems of any of these things that come out, I will try to explain the reasoning behind it, but if it is a general discussion, and general displeasure on how this thing happened I also said earlier that maybe we should look at the process and see a place in this whole process where the different members could be notified, or consulted, whenever a major shift in the capital funding is going to take place. Thank you.