While it will still be some time before B.C. officials can provide preliminary estimates as to how much it will cost to repair the damage from this week’s flooding, it could be the most expensive natural disaster in Canadian history.
Highway bridges need to be replaced, sections of rail lines relaid, and entire communities need to be rebuilt, meaning the cost of the flooding is expected to be unprecedented in B.C.’s history. “There is a significant economic impact of this that grows bigger every day these routes are out,” Kent Fellows, assistant professor of economics and the associate program director of The Canadian Northern Corridor Program at The University of Calgary School of Public Policy, told Global News.