With the big swings in temperature these last few weeks, our roadways are being hit hard. And those potholes have big impacts on our city budget. As a city, we have a lot of roads. In fact, roads are our largest asset and liability.
The good news is that we are completing pothole and roadway repairs more quickly and efficiently than previous years. The bad news, is that unless we curb urban sprawl, we're only going to be adding more roads and making our pothole problems worse.
With the big swings in temperature these last few weeks, our roadways are being hit hard. And those potholes have big impacts on our city budget. As a city, we have a lot of roads. In fact, roads are our largest asset and liability.
The good news is that we are completing pothole and roadway repairs more quickly and efficiently than previous years. The bad news, is that unless we curb urban sprawl, we're only going to be adding more roads and making our pothole problems worse.
Edmontonians are encouraged to sign up for Service Notifications from the City to receive alerts on parking bans and other related information at edmonton.ca/SafeTravels.
Every year our capital budget spends almost $300 million per year on renewing our road network and also an additional $166 million a year in annual operating expenses on our roadways.
As of year-end 2022, the City had a total asset replacement value of $34.7 billion.
The largest asset category was roads and related infrastructure, with an asset replacement value of $14.2 billion, 41% of all City infrastructure.
The average annual capital renewal requirements over 2024 to 2032 to maintain the City’s road network is $296.5 million.
Additionally, the annual operating expenditures required to service Edmonton’s roadway network in 2023, including bridge and road maintenance, snow and ice control, street cleaning, traffic control, on-street parking and traffic safety was $165.6 million.
The City of Edmonton estimates that 9.1% of per-capita vehicle kilometres traveled (VKT) on regional roadways is from Edmonton residents, while 90.9% of per-capita VKT on regional roadways is from regional residents. These figures demonstrate a disproportionate use of City roadways by regional residents.
The City provides a road network capacity that accommodates the demands of the Edmonton metropolitan area population, but generates property tax to support these services only from Edmonton-based properties.
It could be argued that there is an over provision of road network infrastructure by the City of Edmonton to accommodate a broader metropolitan population: in order to accommodate the VKTs of regional road users, the City’s road network is oversized by 47%.
Put another way, if Edmonton did not have a large regional population, its road network would be significantly smaller, with lower operating and renewal costs.
Amidst the madness of the USA offering free reign over their government and spending to a billionaire, you might have missed our own dose of local corporate welfare. Every Albertan should be offended.
I’m not talking about the orphan oil wells bailout or the growing scandal around healthcare contracts, or even Dynalife. I’m talking about a new agreement pulled together between the Provincial Government and Daryl Katz’s OEG Sports & Entertainment (OEGSE). Katz is listed in Maclean's magazine as the 29th wealthiest Canadian.
Sometimes I get asked about why city councillors spend so much energy advocating towards the province. You can’t operate a healthy city in an unhealthy province: Edmonton depends on the provincial government.
A new memo (February 2025) from the assessment and taxation department at the City of Edmonton highlights just how enormous the financial impact of building inwards and upwards is to building a financially resilient and sustainable city.
