A week from election day, Tories tout highway plans, Liberals highlight housing

With a week to go before election day, Nova Scotia's Progressive Conservative and Liberal leaders touted pieces of their platforms while the NDP leader cast her ballot.

At a news conference in Halifax, PC Leader Tim Houston highlighted his party's promise to build and improve highways around Halifax Regional Municipality.

The work would include building a new connector between Hammonds Plains Road and Highway 101, and upgrading three interchanges on Highway 102: the interchange with Highway 101 near Bedford and the interchanges with Hammonds Plains Road and Kearney Lake Road.

The party also promises to add an extra lane in each direction to Highway 102 between exit 0 and exit 4C.

"These projects are a once-in-a-generation investment," Houston said.

The PCs estimate the work will cost $810 million.

Houston said the new and expanded highways would help ease traffic congestion, however his plan ends before reaching HRM's core, where traffic often piles up.

He said "discussions are happening" with the municipality, and he pointed to the Joint Regional Transportation Agency — an organization the PC government established shortly after forming government in 2021— that is supposed to deliver a transportation plan for HRM this month. 

Houston's platform does not touch on public transit in Halifax, but he suggested road improvements have to happen before it can be improved.

"We need to talk about how we move these vehicles around, that's the roads. And then we can also talk about the buses that travel on them. But unless we can move the traffic in a meaningful way, then it's not going to matter."

Houston also spoke about rural highway projects the PCs worked on in their first term and a $1-million fund they created for improvements to rural rinks, arenas and curling clubs.

Liberal Leader Zach Churchill dedicated his news conference Tuesday morning in Halifax to the struggle some Nova Scotians are facing to find and keep affordable housing. He said if the Liberals form government, they would ensure no one in Nova Scotia has to spend more than 30 per cent of their income on housing.

"Our party is the only party offering a complete, balanced plan to protect renters and bring relief and grow our housing supply," he said.

He highlighted his party's promises to establish a rent bank, tie the rent cap to inflation until vacancy rates reach three per cent, put limitations on the use of fixed-term leases, establish a residential tenancies enforcement unit and lower the requirements for accessing rent supplements.