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Canada May Seek Private Partners for Windsor-Detroit Bridge

Nov. 20 (Bloomberg) - Canada may seek companies to help build and operate a new bridge that would ease congestion at a border crossing with the U.S. that handles a quarter of the world's largest trade partnership. The bridge, linking Windsor, Ontario, and Detroit, would be built between 2008 when permits are issued and the end of 2013, Transport Minister Lawrence Cannon said at an industry conference today in Toronto. It would connect Ontario's Highway 401 to the U.S. Interstate system. "We are working closely with our partners to examine possible models for private-sector involvement on both sides of the border," Cannon said in the text of a speech posted on his ministry's Web site. Canada will look at how "to partner with the private sector to design, build, finance, and operate the new crossing," he said. Prime Minister Stephen Harper's Conservative Party government is turning for the second time this month to private partners to help it build infrastructure, as tighter security and rising orders delay shipments between Canada and the U.S. Harper on Nov. 5 asked for private help to build a C$1 billion ($872.1 million) toll road near Montreal. Cannon, 58, didn't say today how much the Windsor- Detroit bridge would cost. Earlier this year, he introduced a bill that would allow him to veto the construction or sale of bridges and tunnels to the U.S. if the government deemed them not in the public interest. Detroit-Windsor border crossings handled C$160 billion of goods shipments in 2004, more than 25 percent of Canada - U.S. trade, Cannon said.

Source: http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601082&sid=aHuAvygySrho&refer=canada

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