The Canada Line connects downtown Vancouver with Richmond and the airport. Its route runs under Cambie Street, a corridor lined with independent shops and restaurants. Construction there ran from 2005 to 2009, according to Business in Vancouver, and the legal disputes it produced were still unresolved years after the trains started running.
Edmonton has its own experience with LRT construction along busy commercial streets. The Canada Line record is public, from planning-stage news coverage through more than a decade of court decisions.
What Was Communicated and When
Early planning for the line showed a bored tunnel under Cambie Street. Boring is more expensive, and it leaves the surface largely undisturbed. The contractor's proposal used cut-and-cover construction, which opens the street from above. CTV News reported that the change saved about $400 million.
In February 2005, The Tyee reported on a public meeting where Cambie residents and merchants said they had first seen the cut-and-cover plans the week before, in an environmental assessment released for comment. A city councillor said earlier presentations had shown a bored tunnel as the preferred method. The project company's chief executive said construction method had always been open, and acknowledged that less time had been spent on methodology during consultation.
The people most affected by the construction method first saw it in an environmental assessment.
An environmental assessment shows cut-and-cover construction on Cambie Street. Residents and merchants hold a public meeting.
Construction along Cambie Street limits access to businesses for several years.
The BC Supreme Court awards a Cambie Street retailer $600,000 in nuisance damages. Around 80 property owners and merchants file a separate class action.
The BC Court of Appeal overturns the $600,000 award on the defence of statutory authority.
In a test case within the class action, the BC Supreme Court awards three businesses compensation for injurious affection.
The BC Court of Appeal overturns the test case judgment and requires individual assessment of each claim.
Business in Vancouver reports that no compensation has been paid to the class action members.
Sources: The Tyee, Georgia Straight, Business in Vancouver (2018), McCarthy Tétrault, Business in Vancouver (2023)
What the Courts Decided
The first case was brought by a retailer near Cambie and 16th Avenue. The trial court found the construction was a nuisance and awarded $600,000. In 2011 the Court of Appeal overturned that award. It found the project had legal authority to build with cut-and-cover, and that the nuisance was an inevitable result of using that authority. A legal summary from Ellis Kerr Burge notes the court accepted that cut-and-cover was the only practically feasible method within the public funding available.
The class action took a different route. It relied on injurious affection under British Columbia's Expropriation Act, a claim where the inevitability of the disruption is not a defence. In 2018 the trial court awarded three test case businesses $128,000, $44,560 and $7,600, as Business in Vancouver reported. In 2020 the Court of Appeal set that judgment aside and ruled that each claim needs its own assessment.
The project's owners and builders spent more than a decade in litigation with businesses along the line. The issue also carried forward to the next project. In 2023, during Broadway Subway construction, a Cambie Street merchant from the class action called for property tax relief and compensation for businesses on the new route.
We have supported communication on LRT construction in Edmonton, including the Valley Line Southeast.
Explore LRT CommunicationsLessons for Transit and Infrastructure Projects
Share the construction method as soon as it is known. If the method is still open, say so in consultation materials and explain how it could change the impact on the street.
Tell businesses what construction will mean for them. General project updates are useful. Business owners also need to know how long their block will be affected and how customers and deliveries will reach their door.
Plan business support before construction starts. Wayfinding, access plans, marketing support and a clear way to raise problems are all easier to put in place before a street closes. Our Valley Line Southeast case study covers our LRT work in Edmonton.
Keep a record of what was said. Commitments made in consultation and in correspondence become part of how a project is judged later. A single place to track them makes it easier to keep them.
Assign one point of contact for each business area. A named person who knows the block and returns calls gives businesses a place to raise problems early.
- Do the businesses on this corridor know which construction method will be used?
- If the method changes, how and when will we tell them?
- Can each business owner find out how long their block will be affected?
- Who is the named contact for each business area, and how quickly do they respond?
- Where are we recording the commitments made during consultation?
Planning construction on a busy corridor?
We help project owners and contractors in Alberta plan business outreach and stakeholder communication before the first lane closes.
