The provincial government is one step closer to getting the Global Transportation Hub off its hands. It was announced on Wednesday that Colliers International will take over management of GTH land.
Minister responsible, Don Morgan says he’s hopeful that Colliers will be able to present the GTH to a national and international market that will make companies interested in purchasing land at the GTH. According to the Global Transportation Hub website, 11 businesses either have or are planning on starting operations at the GTH.
Morgan says he doesn’t know how much Colliers is asking for and how they’ll go about dividing up the land, although he does say that Colliers will likely have numbers ready once December hits, given that’s when the transitional phase will be completed. Morgan also says the province would be welcome to international buyers.
Morgan adds knowing what they know, he says the provincial government wouldn’t have likely got involved in the GTH, although he notes it wasn’t a project that could have been done solely by the private sector.
He says legislation had to be developed for it and work had to be done with other levels of government to get the port authority status so goods could be moved through on a tax free basis.
The GTH has been mired in controversy over the last number of years for questions over who made money off the sale of land.
Colliers is set to take over the management of the GTH lands on October 1st.
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With the announcement on Wednesday that Colliers International being hired to manage the lands of the Global Transportation Hub, the NDP is renewing its concerns for the project and is continuing to call for a judicial inquiry. GTH Critic Cathy Sproule is concerned about transparency. She explains there is no information about what Collier is being paid and now there will be no access, and no transparency for GTH operations.
GTH operations are over $40-million in debt, not including the money it took to create the GTH system, from buying the land, developing it and developing the bypass, which in total Sproule estimates at tens if not hundreds of millions of dollars of taxpayers’ money. She considers the project a colossal mistake.
