ERO #019-2830: Connecting…

ERO #019-2830: Connecting the North: A Draft Transportation Plan for Northern Ontario

Disclaimer: This submission does not constitute as feedback from any Nishnawbe Aski Nation First Nations and is solely the views of NAN Corporate Services.

1. Highway & Road Improvements (Thunder Bay to Nipigon)
Advancing the four-laning of Highway 11/17 is critical to improving driver safety and decreasing commercial vehicle accidents and unnecessary deaths. Each year, several head on collisions occur on highway 11/17 and these accidents are often fatal.

3. Highway & Road Improvements (Kenora to Manitoba)
Widening this section of highway to create 4 lanes is necessary in reducing the number of accidents that occur here each year and will reduce the number of fatalities as a result.

8. Highway & Road Improvements
The First Nations Road Program (FNRP) should be expanded to include additional capacity for funding. On-reserve roads are vital to the health and well being of a community. Safe, maintained roads provide the ability for First Nations to walk around their community and get exercise safely. Poorly maintained roads on reserve create excessive dust, which exacerbates respiratory illnesses, particularly in children. Additional funding to support water trucks to manage dust conditions and/or products that can be applied to dirt road surfaces to reduce dust will improve respiratory health of First Nations.

9. Highway & Road Improvements
The Unincorporated Roads Program must consider those vital connections that aren’t currently supported. In NAN territory as an example, the community of Lac Seul First Nation is underfunded to support necessary road maintenance of the section connecting their community to the Provincial Highway network outside Sioux Lookout, ON. This connecting road is now being used by Sioux Lookout EMS services to respond to calls on reserve, as well as utilized by the Ontario Provincial Police to respond to calls on reserve. The community does not have the funds to support the necessary ongoing maintenance and required resurfacing of this road to ensure driver safety. It is recommended that a review be conducted to ensure all connections to the provincial highway network are being financially supported to ensure driver safety.

14. COVID-19 recovery for small air carriers through bilateral funding agreement
• Vital to the survival of small carriers serving the region; remote airports are the only year-round access for supplies
• Small carriers deliver essential supplies to remote First Nations (food, medicine, medical staff, policing staff, drinking water, fuel, etc.)
• Support for small air carriers should be considered beyond the declared end of the pandemic, as passenger flight volumes are likely to take some time before returning to pre-Covid-19 volumes.

24. Increase contracting opportunities for businesses owned by First Nations
• Remove barriers in provincial procurement processes for First Nation businesses
• Prioritize the use of First Nations owned businesses in procurement; incentives to work with Indigenous owned businesses
• Procurement of First Nations owned businesses in remote First Nations must be expanded to provide opportunities to participate in projects and gain capacity where employment opportunities are extremely limited

25. Continue to improve access to Driver Licensing in remote fly-in northern First Nation communities
• Essential to ensuring equitable access to driver training for Indigenous remote communities
• Consider translation services – Ojicree, Ojibway, Cree
• High demographic of young people; driver training offers opportunities for employment
• Administrative support is necessary to assist First Nations in obtaining the required identification and documentation prior to conducting driver training on-reserve

26. Provide Information to Support Safe Transportation for goods and people
• anti-human trafficking initiatives are critical in preventing future cases of Missing & Murdered Indigenous Women & Girls
• Initiatives should focus on key transit and transportation locations and these locations should be closely monitored
o consider low risk/indiscrete ways for victims to identify they need help at these locations

27. Increase availability of near real-time information, to keep travelers aware of current highway conditions, including accidents, road and weather conditions, snow plow locations and construction activities, to make informed travel decisions
• Needed on winter road network
o No cell service once traveling
o Limited signage
o Limited laybys
o No rest stops
o Limited police patrol
o No formal system to inform public of road conditions/closures/notices (i.e., Covid-19 checkpoints)
 Water crossings - ice thickness measurements needed for safety (community members use informal platforms to share this information, i.e., Facebook)
• Ministry should consider utilizing social media platforms that are commonly used to relay messaging

28. Install eight new Road Weather Information System stations along Highways 11 and 17 as part of 14 new stations in Northern Ontario in addition to 16 mini-stations across Northern Ontario
• These stations should be placed along winter road networks
• Winter road networks and their connection to provincial highway networks are often secondary in priority to receive maintenance, yet are used extensively for a short duration of time, and therefore should be prioritized to ensure essential goods can be
delivered in a safe and timely manner

29. Anti-icing Liquids
• anti-icing liquids would improve safety along connections to the winter road network that are often ice packed and dangerous to travel on
• de-icing liquids at remote airports are required; currently the MTO does not provide de-icing products and applicators at their remote airports; carriers must supply their own and often must travel with the product on board the aircraft with passengers; minimal equipment is available to apply the product at remote airports and this can cause flight interruptions when the entire aircraft cannot be reached with the product
o Ornge requires the tail of the aircraft to be de-iced in poor weather conditions during winter, and often the equipment is not available to do so, which could delay a Medevac flight and result in deterioration of a patient’s health

30. Winter Maintenance
• winter road maintenance from the Musselwhite Mine to Windigo Lake (NORT Road) requires more frequent plowing, widening, ice scraping
• equipment has been a factor in maintaining this road, and it takes lower priority than provincial highway networks in a storm, despite its high traffic volumes; additional equipment to maintain this road is needed

32. Continue to invest in new, improved and rehabilitated rest areas in the North, including additional commercial vehicle parking and safety improvements
• Rest areas/laybys needed along winter road networks to improve safety
o Covid-19 increased this need; drivers unable to stay overnight in communities and must follow local protocols
 Potential to be denied entry; may need to sleep overnight in truck
• More rest areas/laybys needed along provincial highway networks, especially during winter (most are closed & not plowed out in winter)
• Increased lay bys and commercial vehicle parking areas are needed in hub locations that connect to the winter road network (i.e., Pickle Lake, Sioux Lookout, etc.)
o Traffic can be held up for night travel only on winter roads to ensure their viability with warming daytime temperatures and trucks are often backed up with no parking in these locations

33. Drivewyze
• Improvements to Commercial Vehicle Safety has been mandated by the NAN Chiefs-in-Assembly
o more frequent inspections of commercial drivers
o Tracking of driver logs to ensure driving hours are within legal requirements (multiple employers)
o MVIS services should be located on-reserve to ensure the safety of school buses and commercial trucks
 requires investment into on-reserve capacity and training for certified Mechanics
o on-reserve Mechanics could be contracted to work on MTO remote airport equipment and/or other organizations that require this service on-reserve
 MTO currently provides a mechanic from Thunder Bay and incurs high costs in chartering these individuals to remote communities to conduct this work

40. Explore options to support municipal airports given the role they play in providing critical functions such as provincial aerial firefighting, air ambulance and policing, as well as to connect people and move goods throughout the North
• Municipal hub airports in northern Ontario (Pickle Lake, Sioux Lookout, etc.) are a vital connection from remote airports
o Essential for refueling; rerouting flights unable to land at remote airports (bad weather conditions)
• Remote Airports require more support; lower passenger volumes = less revenue generated to support capital infrastructure projects
o Must focus on improving navigational technology, increasing staffing, and expanding runways and terminals at remote airports

41. Improvements to Broadband and Cellular Services
• Expand cellular service range to cover winter road networks & secondary highways for safety and access to information when travelling
• Investments to upgrade the fibre network (KNet, Western James Bay Telecom) serving NAN territory are essential to provide enough bandwidth to deliver online education, telehealth services, justice services, infrastructure operations (WTP/WWTP)
o Cost of increased bandwidth must be offset by government subsidies to be affordable for both ISP’s and communities
o Bell has monopoly, controls pricing and prioritization of upgrades & equipment orders from ISP’s
 Bell has no priority in 807 region to upgrade their equipment; upgrading Bells outdated equipment is essential to improving the fibre network and increasing bandwidth for NAN communities

46. Commercial Vehicle Survey data
• Lack of divided highways, extreme weather conditions and inconsistent commercial driver training nationally = higher risk of accidents; increased # of fatal accidents (head on collisions)
• Winter road travel for commercial drivers lacking experience creates higher risk of accidents
o Lack of enforcement on commercial drivers along winter road networks
• Tracking data on winter road commercial shipments will show the value in winter roads and therefore the need to increase winter road funding to support additional maintenance due to changing weather conditions
o Fluctuating temperatures require significantly more maintenance to maintain winter roads, especially water crossings, and highlight the need to realign roads to establish an all-season road network and install permanent water crossings

48. Increase access to clean and affordable energy
• Replacing local diesel generation on reserve with clean energy requires a collaborative approach and major financial investment in community infrastructure
• Pollution from Diesel generating systems (DGS) is significant
• DGS systems require substantial volumes of fuel to be shipped by winter road every year
o Changing climate is resulting in increased need to ship fuel by aircraft at substantially higher costs due to the shorter winter road season

50. Utilize the most up-to-date climate data and information to make informed decisions
• Climate Change impacts on winter road networks must be studied in northern Ontario
o Data will show the increasing need to transition to All-season road (ASR) networks to support the vital transportation network of essential supplies to remote First Nations
• Climate change impacts on air travel in northern Ontario should be examined
o Fluctuating temperatures in the James Bay lowlands is resulting in more inclement weather (i.e., freezing rain, fog, etc.)
 MTO remote airports do not have LPV technology and therefore pilots have higher decision penalties when landing to ensure safety, resulting in an increase in missed approaches
• Direct impact on communities when essential supplies, Medevacs, service providers, etc. cannot access communities in a timely manner

53. Explore the potential of new and emerging freight transportation technologies
• Must consider weather challenges and distances in northern Ontario
• Will not have the ability to replace the need for improved winter road networks and transition to ASR networks for the future sustainability of communities

55. Rehabilitation of existing, and the planning and development of new transportation corridors in Northern Ontario
• Securing aggregate for construction of all-season roads to connect remote First Nations is essential
o The vast area of northern Ontario is James Bay lowlands and is comprised of muskeg, swamps, rivers, lakes, etc. and aggregate is not readily available in many locations (substantial volumes will be required)
• Securing aggregate for MTO remote northern airports is vital to rehabilitation of aging gravel runways, and there is need for runway extensions and widening with future improvements to navigational technology (LPV approaches)

57. Continue to invest in remote airports to ensure they remain in good operating condition
• Remote airports currently require
o additional full-time staff 7 days/week to guarantee service
o improved Navigational technology (LPV) to ensure flights can land during inclement weather safely (low cloud ceiling common, fast changing weather systems, climate change impacts)
o expansion/updating of terminal buildings (i.e., lacking potable water, secondary washrooms, space for passengers, private search areas, etc.)
o extension of runways where possible to facilitate larger aircraft
 larger aircraft = more affordable cargo shipping; more fuel efficient
 larger aircraft = faster, more efficient evacuations in emergencies (Hercules cannot land on gravel runways in winter)

58. Support remote and northern airports as part of COVID-19 recovery to ensure ongoing operations and the continuation of essential material shipments
• additional airport staff needed; current duties are extensive; limited staff at airports = burnout, no ability to take time off for rest, hunting, etc.
o Covid-19 has added pressure to staff at remote airports (fogging, disinfection, managing flow of passengers, etc.)
• MTO remote airports require additional heated space on site for separating incoming and outgoing passengers to prevent the spread of COVID-19 (secondary structures)

59. Explore expanding winter road inspection and oversight using ground-penetrating radar to monitor ice thickness
• Critical to improving safety along winter road networks
• Climate change temperature fluctuations making ice thickness unpredictable, thinner than historical measurements
• Public information system is needed to ensure safety of those travelling on winter roads (ice thickness on water crossings should be made public information)
• Additional capacity in winter road funding is needed to allow for more ice capping to increase ice thickness at water crossings

60. Explore improving water crossings on winter roads using portable bridges and arch culverts to help maintain these vital links to remote communities
• Improving water crossings essential to ensure the sustainability of winter road networks (permanent crossings)
• Improved water crossings should be placed strategically to move towards all season road networks for the future where communties are supportive of an ASR connection
• Access to federal funding would expedite these improvements as winter road funding is currently limited and determined on an annual basis

61. In partnership with the federal government, create a training program for winter road builders to share construction and maintenance practices
• Supportive of this idea
o Increased local capacity to build/maintain winter roads creates community employment & improved road conditions
o Additional funding capacity for winter road staff would be required
o Remove the need for communities to sub out to contractors that lack the experience working on winter roads (requires additional capacity to ensure communities have the necessary equipment, i.e., groomers, grader, pumps/hoses, etc.)

62. Continue to support the Ontario Provincial Police and Nishnawbe Aski Police Service to monitor winter roads
• Police require more capacity to monitor winter road networks
• Duties within communities are priority

64. Initiate an all-season roads strategy for Far North
• Could be productive to better understand what each community wants & plan accordingly for all season road development while respecting that some communities may not want an ASR connection
• A strategy should outline the most unified approach to constructing all season road networks as to reduce impacts on the environment, wildlife migrations/habitat, and respect traditional lands

65. Support Windigo First Nations Council in their continuing outreach efforts among member communities in their development of an all‐season road strategy
• Support for ASR development is essential for First Nations/Tribal Councils who wish to pursue this and have made great efforts to advance their projects

66. The province has committed to fund long-term maintenance of the Pickle Lake Northern Ontario Resource Transportation (NORT) road extension
• Supportive of this initiative
• NORT road requires improved winter maintenance (plowing, sanding, ice scraping, widening, etc.)
o Snow conditions can narrow roadway; secondary highway = less of priority to maintain
o Significant traffic volumes during winter road season; maintenance should be a higher priority

67. Commence a study in partnership with the federal government, municipal partners, and First Nation communities, to identify options for governance, ownership, and roles and responsibilities for roads connecting First Nation communities to the provincial highway network
• Long standing jurisdictional issue that must be resolved
• First Nations responsible for maintaining current connections to provincial highway networks are underfunded (i.e., Lac Seul FN)