Am I Dreaming? New Massey + Roberts Bank | C&C #47

Same podium. Same Friday. Ottawa put Roberts Bank Terminal 2 on the national-interest list — a $5.9-billion container terminal with a final investment decision by mid-2027 and operations four years sooner than planned. Then Transport Minister Steven MacKinnon turned to the Massey crossing and said the feds support "crossing that river, whatever way the Premier tells us to." Premier-designate Lorne Doerkson: "We have committed to a bridge."

Episode 47 of ICBA Coffee & Construction — the news that matters to the people who build British Columbia and Alberta, with ICBA's Jordan Bateman.

On today's show:

☕ THE BIG ONE: Roberts Bank Terminal 2 is now a project of national interest — $5.9 BILLION, 2.4 million more containers a year, 17,000 supply-chain jobs, FID mid-2027, operations in 2035 instead of 2039. TerraMarine (Aecon-led) stays the preferred builder. And at the same Delta podium, Ottawa backs Doerkson's 10-lane Massey bridge "in principle." The history: a funded, under-budget bridge cancelled by the NDP in 2017; a tunnel that went from $4.15 billion to $8.5 billion; nine years, zero lanes, double the price. Eby called the bridge "the stupidest idea." What was stupid is that his government cancelled it.

🛢️ The tanker-ban repeal bill is dead — C-264 voted down Oct. 28 on party lines. Doerkson didn't back it: "Our government's focus is on the project in front of us." Pacific Link — a million barrels a day, September 2027 construction target.

🇺🇸 No steel deal before the U.S. midterms. Trump says the two countries have "the concept of a very good deal" — and tossed in Keystone XL. Until then it's 50 PER CENT on steel. Your rebar invoice doesn't care about concepts.

🚧 Where the work is: Cariboo Gold is 28% built, $355 million spent, 400-plus on site, and JDS Energy & Mining has the underground development contract — first gold Q1 2029. Ledcor breaks ground on Calgary's $170-million Northeast Athletic Complex. The Green Line's first bridge is finished.

🏠 Doerkson will scrap the NDP's municipal housing targets and amend the multiplex law. The Victoria builders say pump the brakes — missing-middle homes up 47%. Our line: local control is fine, local delay is not. Permits in months, not years. We will hold him to it.

🖥️ Alberta's data-centre boom needs electricians, not pauses: a 920-MW gas plant approved for Beacon's Sturgeon County campus, a province-commissioned report warning of an 8,000-to-17,000 trades shortfall.