The City of Windsor has hired a lawyer to once again take on the Ambassador Bridge Company.
Council met behind closed doors Thursday to hire David Estrin.
Meanwhile, the project to build a twin spin on the city's west end is taking another step forward.
As of Thursday, the public has 60 days to provide feedback to http://www.tc.gc.ca/eng/page-653.html Transport Canada on the proposed twinning of the Ambassador Bridge.
Already, the city is prepping their thoughts, but no one is more concerned than those living in Olde Sandwich Towne, right where this project needs to go.
Terry Kennedy lives two and a half blocks from the Ambassador Bridge. He doesn't want to live any closer.
“I'm ready to fight and write up, again, all I know about this bridge company,” says Kennedy.
Kennedy says there are 15,000 people who live in the area.
“It’s going to be destroyed if they can do this,” says Kennedy.
The project up for discussion involves three changes - expand the Windsor customs plaza, rehabilitate the Canadian approach to the bridge and construct a replacement bridge across the Detroit River.
The work would cut through Olde Sandwich Towne. Dozens of homes are already owned by the bridge company. They now sit boarded up and neglected, waiting to be torn down to make way for a potential twin span of the bridge.
Windsor mayor Drew Dilkens called the last minute in-camera meeting of council to approve Estrin’s hiring. The environmental lawyer from Toronto has handled most of the city’s cross-border issues for close to a decade.
He is now tasked with reminding Transport Canada about the potential problems with a twin span.
“Look at the parkway,” says Dilkens. “When we started out it was at grade, but because we hired lawyers and fought and we argued, what you see today is a below grade highway with mitigation factors.”
