e-345 (Protection of the environment)

Petition to the Government of Canada

• The Massey Tunnel Replacement Bridge puts at risk the ecology of the Fraser River estuary, impacting wild life in the region, as the Fraser is a designated Canadian Heritage River and the Fraser River Delta is a Ramsar protected international wetland site under the responsibility of the Federal Government;
• The Massey Tunnel Replacement Bridge puts at risk fisheries, especially salmon juveniles in the mouth of the Fraser River and mature fish on their return due to climate impacts and local, general, cumulative industrial/marine stress;
• Removal of the Massey Tunnel would increase the salinity of the Delta impacting agricultural irrigation for farms along the river;
• The Massey Tunnel Replacement Bridge would cause the loss of farmland to industrialization and urbanization facilitated by highway expansion sprawl and would directly impact farmland due to construction of the bridge and new highway infrastructure;
• The Massey Tunnel Replacement Bridge would have health impacts for the City of Richmond and region due to degraded air quality as a result of traffic congestion at Vancouver crossings and future increased traffic volumes, and also due to increased tanker traffic and their berthing;
• The Massey Tunnel Replacement Bridge would increase British Columbia’s and Canada’s Green House Gas (GHG) emissions over the bridge’s life span and facilitate larger downstream emissions due to larger capacity coal and LNG tankers; and
• The Massey Tunnel Replacement Bridge would have safety implications related to large dangerous goods marine traffic, such as LNG and Jet Fuel tankers, in the vicinity of local communities and in proximity of the crossing itself.