Jack Danylchuk
Northern News Services
Wednesday, May 23, 2007

YELLOWKNIFE - A line in this year's federal budget that marked $68 million for public-private partnerships on infrastructure projects has prompted the territorial government to knock the mothballs off its plan to bridge the Mackenzie River at Fort Providence.

"We're asking for $50 million of that," said Premier Joe Handley, who justified the size of his government's expectation on the state of the Mackenzie Bridge project.

"We don't have a construction contract, but we don't know of any other project in the country that is at the same stage of development," Handley said.

"If we wait another year, the cost could be $20 million more."

The project was shelved last year when cost estimates for the bridge doubled to $120 million from $60 million three years earlier.

Handley said he asked the Deh Cho Bridge Corporation, the private company formed to manage the project, to revive talks with the companies interested in building the bridge and TD Securities, which was to provide financing.

"They are working on the details now," said Handley, who would not identify the company that might build the 1.2 km bridge.

According to the original plan, the bridge was to be paid for with money diverted from Mackenzie ferry operations and a $6 per tonne toll on commercial vehicles.

The plan would work if the federal government chips in.

If it doesn't "I think voters will ask what they're doing for us," Handley said.