City council votes to expropriate businesses for Valley Line West LRT

Edmonton city council voted unanimously Tuesday toexpropriate businesses in the path of the future Valley Line West LRT.

Ten properties along the route are on the chopping block, scattered along Stony Plain Roadfrom 121st Street to 151st Street. Other businesses have already been bought out by the city over the past two years.

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For Liquor International, a store on 151st Street and Stony Plain Road, the future is unclear.

"It's a bit discouraging that the business has been improving substantially over the couple of years that I've been here, and to what end?"Jim Pettinger, store manager said.

"It doesn't matter where this business goes, at some point, it's dead through no fault of my own and nothing that anyone can do about."

Finding another location in the area is not an easy task because of what Pettinger callsa "ridiculous" bylaw.

"There are no places around here that we could move to that aren't within 500 metres of an existing liquor store," he said. "That's the problem."

'It's never a perfect situation'

Coun. Andrew Knack said businesses will have more than enough time to look around at available locations, with LRT construction starting at the earliest in late 2019.

He called expropriation a "last resort" for the city.

"It's never a perfect situation, but I do think what's good is that this information has been out so far in advance, so many years out, that it hopefully has allowed a lot of these people who are running these businesses along these affected properties to be prepared for that," he said.

"There will still be ample time to prepare to work on any type of transition plan," Knack added.

'What are our options?'

Pettinger said the city told the business that they could move somewhere that doesn't have the liquor store bylaw in effect, like an industrial area or the outskirts of Edmonton.

"Basically, that means we're starting over," Pettinger said.

Pettingersaid knew expropriation was coming, but still wants concrete answers for what the store can do as LRT construction looms.

"It would be nice to actually know something so that plans can be made," Pettinger said. "When will this happen? What are our options? Where can we go?"

"They are about to put an awful lot of people and businesses in serious financial harm," he added.

"It does not seem to me that they've given any real thought to the effect that this is going to have on businesses and traffic on a fairly major route through Edmonton."