Ontario Construction News staff writer
About 34 per cent of provincial infrastructure assets are currently not in a state of good repair, the Financial Accountability Office of Ontario (FAO) reports.
By sector, nearly half of hospital sector assets are not in a state of good repair, while the highways and bridges sector has a relatively higher share of assets in a state of good repair (77.3 per cent), compared to the provincial average.
Findings are based on a review of asset condition data provided by the province.
The FAO report released last week provides an overview of the infrastructure assets owned by the Province, assesses the state of repair of those assets, and estimates the cost to bring Provincial infrastructure into a state of good repair in 2020-21 and over the next 10 years.
Infrastructure assets include transit, highways and bridges, hospitals, schools and colleges, and government offices, correctional facilities and courthouses. The FAO estimates that the current replacement value of the Province’s infrastructure was $265.6 billion as of March 31, 2020.
- Highways and bridges ($84.7 billion), schools ($68.1 billion) and hospitals ($58.5 billion) account for nearly 80 per cent of the value of the Province’s infrastructure assets.
- Ontario’s highways and bridges sector has the lowest infrastructure backlog relative to the value of the sector’s assets (2.2 per cent), implying that assets in this sector are in relatively better condition compared to the provincial average.
- Ontario’s transit sector has the largest infrastructure backlog relative to the value of the sector’s assets (16.7 per cent), implying that assets in the transit sector are in relatively worse condition compared to the provincial average.
- Based on the capital plan in the 2019 budget, the FAO projects that the Province’s infrastructure backlog will deteriorate over the next 10 years, reaching $22.7 billion by 2029-30.
- Highways and bridges are projected to be the only sector with sufficient funding over the next 10 years to maintain its assets in a state of good repair. All other sectors have been allocated inadequate funding, with the most significant shortfall occurring in the transit sector, with a $7.2 billion funding gap.
The FAO estimates that the cost to bring the Province’s assets into a state of good repair (in other words, to eliminate the infrastructure backlog) was $16.8 billion in 2020-21. Hospital sector assets represent the largest share of the infrastructure backlog at $4.8 billion, followed by transit ($4.0 billion) and schools ($3.7 billion).
Over the next 10 years, the FAO estimates that the cost to eliminate the infrastructure backlog and maintain the Province’s assets in a state of good repair will be $64.5 billion. However, based on a review of the 10-year capital plan in the 2019 Ontario Budget, the FAO found that Ontario allocated only $47.7 billion to capital repairs.
As a result, the 2019 budget’s capital plan will not adequately address the Province’s infrastructure backlog over the next 10 years.
Read the full report here.
