Vancouver may be looking into its past to showcase a demonstration streetcar system during the Olympic Games, but there’s no guarantee that expanded streetcar service will stick around once the Games are history.

City council voted unanimously on March 11 to approve the $8.5-million replacement of a railway track between Granville Island and the future 2nd Avenue Canada Line station. This will allow the Downtown Historic Railway, which currently runs in summer, to continue operating. City staff will now look into the possibility of leasing two modern streetcar trains for use during the 2010 games.

“I think it’s very desirable for us to put that streetcar grid back into the city,” said NPA councillor Suzanne Anton during the council meeting. “I think it’s good for the city, something that citizens would be very enthusiastic about, and it’s something that everyone on this council is enthusiastic about as well.”

The streetcar system could potentially be expanded after 2010 to run from False Creek to Stanley Park, as well as along Pacific Boulevard, and there are rumblings about a further extension along the Arbutus corridor to intersect existing public-transit routes.

“I’d like to reiterate the importance of that future connection of the streetcar line to the Arbutus corridor,” Anton said. “Certainly it’s mine and probably everyone in this council’s desire to see that connection made in the future.”

Although council was mainly enthusiastic, Dale Bracewell, manager of Olympic transportation for the city, stressed that no funding or approvals were yet in place for a permanent streetcar.

“At this time, we definitely don’t have committed senior government partners, which would be essential to realizing the full potential of the streetcar project past 2010,” Bracewell said during his report to council. “No funding has yet been committed, either regionally or provincially, at this time.”

The only partner confirmed in the streetcar plan is the Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation’s Granville Island office, which contributed $65,000 dollars to preliminary streetcar research and is seeking approval in its capital plan to designate $500,000 for the construction of the streetcar line and to build a station on Granville Island.

Lino Siracusa, director of CMHC Granville Island, told the Straight that he is optimistic about the eventual outcome of the project.

“What we’re putting in place is obviously for the demonstration, but we imagine that one day the full project will be put into place,” Siracusa said. “Granville Island has for the past year been taking a look at all of our transportation options and dealing with concerns related to parking. We diversified ways of coming to the island, whether it’s by bicycle, bus, or streetcar.”

Despite Siracusa’s vision, NPA councillor Peter Ladner expressed reservations during the council meeting that the 2010 streetcar demonstration might leave the City of Vancouver on the hook and out of luck.

“My concern is that we invest our eight-and-a-half million dollars, we get our demonstration going, and everybody thinks it’s fantastic,” Ladner said. “Then the Olympics come and go and people are going to be hounding on us to keep [the streetcars] going. We’ll potentially be on the hook for maintaining, running, and operating these things if TransLink stays away, which so far they seem very inclined to do.”

Concerns were also raised by the owners of two water-taxi services, Granville Island Ferries and Aquabus, which run routes that mirror those of the proposed streetcar system. With TransLink currently not on board, there was no word on how fare pricing for the trains would stack up against those offered by the ferry services.

Vancouver used streetcars and trams extensively from 1890 to 1958. The modern streetcars that the city is looking to use for the demonstration are the type used south of the border, in Tacoma and Portland.

“Ultimately, we do still hope that the downtown streetcar project will be fully in place one day,” Bracewell said to council, “but in the absence of actually knowing that timing, we feel that the recommendations presented today are a good stand-alone project which gives the public a chance to see what we need in the future.”