Final Report - Joint Evaluation of Infrastructure Canada's Canada Strategic Infrastructure Fund and Border Infrastructure Fund

Conclusions and Recommendations within Executive Summary

Relevance: CSIF and BIF programs remain relevant. Both programs have responded to large-scale infrastructure needs and are aligned with INFC's strategic outcomes and federal government priorities.

Performance – Program design and delivery: Flexibility in program design and delivery, such as project extensions to address many risks associated with complex, large-scale, multi-partner projects as well as the variety of eligible project categories supported program success. In addition, INFC is moving forward on improving the use of information technology for large-scale infrastructure projects though the establishment of the Project Information Management System.

Performance – Effectiveness: CSIF and BIF have directly supported a substantial number of new strategic infrastructure and border-related infrastructure projects in Canada. Infrastructure investments supported the building of new infrastructure as well as the expansion and upgrading of current infrastructure and were found to be benefitting Canadians and addressing real needs. By the end of the programs, 94 large-scale infrastructure projects will be completed.

Both programs have demonstrated progress toward the completion of immediate outcomes (completion of assets and investment leveraged). While some data collection practices are in place, there is a need for a consistent mechanism for recipients to collect performance data on project outcomes following project completion.

Recommendation #1: To improve data collection practices and support program performance reporting, Program Operations Branch should put in place a mechanism for recipients to collect and report outcome data following project completion for the remaining CSIF projects as well as other ongoing and future INFC programs.

The total eligible cost of each project is estimated at the time when funding agreements are signed by all parties. INFC's contribution is between 25 and 75 percent of the total eligible costs, depending on the project category. However, the final project costs (including eligible and ineligible) are not known until the projects are completed, and the information on ineligible costs is not always provided to INFC. Because this information is often lacking, it is not possible to compare initial estimated project costs to the final project costs. The collection of final project costs would provide more accurate data on the actual investment leveraged from funding partners. Furthermore, this information could be useful for better forecasting of project cost estimates for similar types of projects.

Recommendation #2: Program Operations Branch should obtain final project costing data once projects are completed and all costs have been incurred. This information could be collected and reported in conjunction with outcome data following project completion.

Performance – Efficiency and Economy: The CSIF program was allocated 4.4 percent of the total program funding envelope to address administrative costs. The allocation for BIF represented 7 percent of the program funding envelope. However, administrative allocations for each program do not represent the direct cost to administer the program as these allocations supported the department's overall operating budget as a whole as well program administration costs of the Federal Delivery Partners (FDPs).

Both CSIF and BIF programs have undergone formal and informal reviews and INFC has taken some actions to improve the program design and delivery for current and successor infrastructure programs. Some potential efficiency issues (e.g. timing and process delays; overlapping roles and responsibilities between INFC and FDPs) were raised in qualitative information received from recipients. However, information on program efficiency is not measured and addressed in a systematic manner. As a result, the evaluation did not find sufficient data to adequately assess program efficiency.

Recommendation #3: In order to assess the efficiency of program delivery, Infrastructure Canada should establish a pilot-project to develop and test efficiency indicators.

Management agrees with the recommendations and has developed management action plans.

Context of evaluation

Infrastructure Canada's (INFC) Evaluation Directorate conducted an evaluation of the Canada Strategic Infrastructure Fund (CSIF) and the Border Infrastructure Fund (BIF), which are two of the Department's cost-shared programs with federal, provincial/territorial and municipal partners. The evaluation was identified in Infrastructure Canada's five-year evaluation plan and was carried out in accordance with the 2009 Treasury Board Policy on Evaluation.

Purpose and scope

The purpose of the evaluation was to assess the relevance and performance (effectiveness, efficiency and economy) of the CSIF and BIF programs.

The scope of the evaluation included all projects undertaken within CSIF and BIF and the INFC contributions disbursed from 2002-03 to 2012-13 inclusively. This included a population of 83 CSIF projects and 11 BIF projects within a combined funding envelope of $5.6 billion as per INFC's program information which is captured primarily in the Shared Information Management System for Infrastructure (SIMSI).

Background

Canada Strategic Infrastructure Fund under Background

CSIF was announced in Budget 2001 as a $2 billion program. It was established under the Canada Strategic Infrastructure Fund Act, which received Royal Assent on March 27, 2002. The CSIF was designed to advance the Government of Canada's agenda for urban communities, by providing federal funding for large-scale infrastructure projects that fostered economic growth or improved the quality of life for Canadians.

Budget 2003 provided an additional $2 billion to be invested under the CSIF Program. Two dedicated funding envelopes under this additional funding were allocated to National Projects ($200 million) and large-scale infrastructure projects benefiting municipalities of less than 250,000 residents (10 percent of the $2 billion, net of funding provided to National Projects, research studies and program administration). A top-up amount announced in Budget 2006 has brought the total amount of federal contributions approved to date under CSIF to $4.3 billion. A combination of transfers in and out of the program increased the total allocations by $639 million for a total resource allocation of $4.9 billion.

In 2012, the Programs' Terms and Conditions were updated to remove the original program end dates of 2012-13, as projects have been extended on a case-by-case basis. This provides funding recipients with flexibility that is often required when constructing large-scale strategic infrastructure projects.

Border Infrastructure Fund under Background

The $600 million Border Infrastructure Fund (BIF) was also launched as part of Budget 2001. The BIF was established to support the alleviation of traffic congestion, increase crossing capacity and increase security and safety at borders. BIF investments support Canada's six largest¹ surface border crossings as well as smaller border crossings throughout Canada to alleviate border traffic congestion, increase border-crossing capacity and increase security and safety at borders. Various adjustments including transfers in and out as well as Strategic Reviews in 2011-12 and 2012-13 resulted in a total BIF allocation of $646.6 million.

Program Objectives

The CSIF and BIF objectives are described below:

• The objective of the CSIF is to support large-scale strategic infrastructure projects that contribute to economic growth and quality of life in Canada.
• The objective of the BIF is to support Canada's growing economic and trade relationship with the United States through reductions in congestion and enhancements to capacity, security and safety at border crossings.

Program activities, outputs and outcomes

The program activities, outputs and outcomes that were identified in the 2012 CSIF and BIF Logic Models are listed in Table 1.

The Performance Measurement (PM) Strategies for both CSIF and BIF were updated in 2012.

Eligible project categories

The CSIF and BIF programs provide funding for infrastructure projects across Canada. For CSIF, infrastructure is defined as fixed capital assets that are used or operated for the benefit of the public. For BIF, fixed capital assets and technological infrastructure were eligible for funding.

Each program's Terms and Conditions list eligible project categories (see Table 2).

Cost-Sharing Requirements under Section 2: Program Profiles

CSIF and BIF are cost-shared programs. According to the CSIF Business Model (2012), cost-sharing requirements are in place to ensure that funding from other partners is leveraged through federal infrastructure spending. For both programs, there is a Contribution Agreement (CA) for each project which specifies a dollar cap for the federal share, with the maximum federal contribution of 50 percent of total eligible costs. For CSIF, exceptions were made for advanced telecommunications, high-speed broadband and northern infrastructure projects. In these cases, the maximum total federal contribution is 75 percent of total eligible costs.

Federal Budget 2006 states the Government's intention to maximize value for taxpayers' money by supporting infrastructure projects that adhere to best practices, by not funding cost overruns and by requiring fund recipients to be accountable to Canadian Taxpayers. The CSIF and BIF programs comply with this principle by ensuring that when additional costs are incurred above the original estimated cost, it is the responsibility of the recipients and other funding partners to pay them.

Key Stakeholders

The programs are administered in collaboration with FDPs, where other federal departments and regional development agencies conduct oversight of projects based on regional-knowledge and/or area of expertise.

Program delivery and oversight is conducted through INFC and two main stakeholder groups:

INFC is responsible for program oversight and funding. The Department determines program design, selects projects based on national or regional priorities, and prepares Treasury Board (TB) Submissions for projects. It then enters into a Contribution Agreement (CA) with funding recipients. INFC is also responsible for measuring and reporting on program results to Parliament and Canadians.

Federal Delivery Partners (FDPs): Upon project approval and the signing of a CA, in most cases, a FDP will act on INFC's behalf to monitor the implementation of the project. For CSIF, FDPs include:

• Aboriginal Affairs and Northern Development Canada;
• Atlantic Canada Opportunities Agency;
• Western Economic Diversification;
• Canada Economic Development for Quebec Regions;
• Federal Economic Development Agency for Southern Ontario;
• Transport Canada;
• Canadian Northern Economic Development Agency;
• Industry Canada; and
• Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation.

In recent years, due to varying circumstances, INFC repatriated some ongoing CSIF projects – greatly reducing the reliance on FDPs. For BIF, the only FDP used is Transport Canada (TC).

The collaboration between INFC and the FDPs is documented in a Memoranda of Understanding (MOU) which delineate roles, responsibilities and accountabilities including monitoring and reporting, information management, communications, and financial management.

Funding Recipients: Individual funding recipients ensure that the projects are completed and reported on as agreed upon in the CAs. The program Terms and Conditions for CSIF and BIF provided information on the types of recipients that would be eligible to receive funding from the programs.

The following table lists the types of recipients eligible for each program:

Uptake of CSIF and BIF funding has mostly been from other levels of government, which means that recipients have consisted largely of provincial, territorial, municipal or regional governments. In some cases, funding arrangements were formed with private sector or not-for-profit recipients such as the Canada Opera House Corporation and the Charlottetown Harbour Authority Inc.

Project Governance

CA Governance – Agreement Management Committee Structure. While recipients are responsible for managing and monitoring the individual projects, each CA stipulates that an Agreement Management Committee (AMC) is formed, composed of INFC, FDP and recipient representatives. The purpose of the AMC is to ensure that obligations in the CA are met by the parties and that Canada is informed in a timely manner of all aspects that may impact the project objectives (scope, timeline and budget). The AMC also holds a risk management role in its review of potential risks to the project as they arise, and ascertaining whether the recipient is taking appropriate action to manage these risks.

Program Resources

Federal Budgets 2001 and 2003 each provided $2 billion for CSIF. An additional $300 million was added in Budgets 2006 and 2007 through the Economic Action Plan initiative and a combination of transfers and adjustments resulted in a total funding allocation of $4.9 billion.

Federal Budget 2001 announced $600 million in funding for BIF. Various adjustments and transfers resulted in a total BIF allocation of $646.6 million.

Departmental Program Spending

After subtracting the administrative allocations (CSIF: $44.8 million; BIF: $6.4 million) from the total program funding available, the revised allocations for CSIF and BIF were $4.7 billion and $602 million respectively. Of these amounts, 82.5 percent of CSIF funding and 84.2 percent of BIF funding have already been transferred to recipients from 2002-03 to 2012-13. See Table 5 for an overview of actual and planned spending for CSIF and BIF.

Question #1: Is there a continued need for the CSIF and BIF programs?

There is continued need for programs that invest in the large-scale infrastructure requirements of Canadian communities and that are dedicated to improving physical and technological infrastructure along the Canada and U.S. border. This has been validated by the following findings:

The CSIF and BIF programs have remained active throughout their intended lifespan. Uptake on the funding has been continuous and funding is addressing a cross-section of needs including that of new, renewed and expanded infrastructure. In its early stages, CSIF expanded to include additional investment categories in order to address emerging infrastructure needs.

There are already successor programs in place that deal with similar needs that had been addressed as part of CSIF and BIF. INFC's active Building Canada Fund–Major Infrastructure Component Program invests in large, strategic projects of national and regional significance² and both the Asia-Pacific Gateway and Corridor Initiative and the Gateways and Border Crossings Fund support projects to facilitate trade and goods movements, including key border crossings. The New Building Canada Fund, as announced in Canada's Economic Action Plan 2013, has been mandated to support "major economic infrastructure projects."³ Economic Action Plan 2013 also announced further funding for border infrastructure projects.

In Budget 2011, the Government indicated that it would develop a new plan to support public infrastructure that would extend beyond the expiry of the 2007 Building Canada Plan. As such, in 2012, INFC began an extensive consultation process and met with 150 provincial, territorial, regional, municipal and private sector stakeholders on the development of the new long-term infrastructure plan. In these consultations as well as in the evaluation interviews, many concrete examples of infrastructure needs across Canada and across all current CSIF and BIF investment categories were cited. Those mentioned were related to wastewater treatment, local transit and highway transportation, arts and culture, sports, recreation, broadband, efficiency at border crossings and upgrades required for infrastructure affected by climate change.

One study done by the Federation of Canadian Municipalities (FCM)⁴ indicates that as of 2007 the infrastructure deficit was in the hundreds of billions and that this includes 'sub-deficits' for key categories: water and waste water systems; transportation; transit; waste management; and community, recreational, cultural and social infrastructure⁵ — all project types currently funded by CSIF. Further to this, even though from "2001 to 2010, the average age of infrastructure fell to 14.7 years from 17.1, the Association of Consulting Engineers of Canada estimates that 50 percent of public infrastructure will have reached the end of its serviceable lifespan by 2027."⁶

Question #2: Were the CSIF and BIF objectives consistent with federal government priorities and INFC strategic outcomes?

The CSIF and BIF have been aligned with both the Federal Government and INFC's priorities and objectives since program inception in 2001. This has been validated by the following findings.

Federal Budget 2001 announced the Government's priorities related to targeted investments in both large-scale infrastructure and border-related infrastructure projects. At that time, $2 billion was committed to fund large strategic projects, and $600 million was committed to help make the border more efficient⁷. This was the start of the CSIF and BIF programs. In Budget 2003, the Federal Government reinforced this priority by adding another $2 billion to CSIF.

Since program inception, CSIF and BIF have remained aligned with the Federal Government's evolving priorities. This is based on a trend analysis of the Government's annual Speech from the Throne⁸. Between 1999 and 2011 there were nine themes that were generally consistent in the Speech. When reviewing CSIF and BIF objectives, as broken down by investment category⁹, it was found that CSIF and BIF have clear alignments to six of the nine reoccurring government priorities (See Graphic 1). This was corroborated by results reported from the projects reviewed within the scope of this evaluation.

Graphic 1: Alignment of CSIF and BIF Program Objectives to the Federal Government's Priorities

Text description for Graphic 1

The CSIF and BIF aimed to achieve benefits for communities, the environment and economy, which are constant themes outlined in INFC Strategic Outcomes. Similar to the analysis described above, an internal review was undertaken of the departmental outcomes of the years since the programs' inceptions. According to departmental Reports on Plans and Priorities, the INFC strategic outcomes under which CSIF and BIF fall have continuously focused on achieving benefits for communities, the environment and the economy.

According to the 2011-12 Departmental Performance Report (DPR), the strategic outcome supported by the programs is "Funding for quality, cost-effective public infrastructure that meets the needs of Canadians in a competitive economy, a cleaner environment and liveable communities is provided," which mirrors the intended outcomes of the programs and is supported by the program objectives denoted above.

Question #3: Are there legitimate and necessary roles for the federal government in delivering the CSIF and BIF programs?

There is still a legitimate and necessary role for the Federal Government to fund programs that support Canada's large-scale infrastructure and border-related infrastructure needs. This was supported by the following findings:

INFC's mandate is, among other things, to deliver programs which support public infrastructure initiatives. In 2002, a role specific to funding large-scale strategic infrastructure was articulated when the Canada Strategic Infrastructure Fund Act was introduced as part of Bill C-49. In March 2002, this Act received Royal Assent in order to establish a program to provide contributions for the development of strategic infrastructure projects. In the same year, both CSIF and BIF were established.

Since the inception of CSIF and BIF, studies have continued to highlight the need for federal funding to help address large infrastructure deficits that have, at times, been reportedly upwards of $120 billion;¹⁰ and to mitigate the challenge that 50 percent of public infrastructure will have reached the end of its serviceable lifespan by 2027.¹¹ In parallel to this, CSIF and BIF funding recipients indicated that "infrastructure projects would either not have been undertaken for many years, or may not have been undertaken at all," had federal funding not been available.¹² In addition to providing much-needed funding, some recipients indicated that without federal participation, they would not have had the ability to leverage the non-federal portion of funding necessary to implement their infrastructure projects. Federal participation provided a sense of stability to projects and in turn instilled a comfort level for other investors — both public and private — to become involved.

Recipient interviewees noted that there are outstanding infrastructure needs that require federal funding. Further to this, INFC conducted a national consultation process on Canada's long-term infrastructure plan, where municipal, provincial and territorial stakeholders continued to express a need for further federal funding to support both emerging and long standing infrastructure needs and the idea that there is a necessary role for the federal government to play with regards to long-term funding.

Question #4: Were the CSIF and BIF design and implementation processes appropriate to produce the expected outputs?

Flexibility

In terms of program delivery, flexibility was important in order to meet program requirements. This was partly demonstrated in the granting of project extensions, as they were required to adjust for delays caused by unforeseen circumstances (e.g., changing labour costs, unforeseen weather changes, etc.). However, it was also seen by recipients to be a critical aspect of the programs when it came to the day-to-day planning around the many risks relative to complex, large-scale, multi-partner projects.

CSIF and BIF were designed to last over the span of ten years, but both programs have been extended on a project-by-project basis. The extension of individual projects has occasionally required the Government of Canada to reprofile funds from one year to the next, which ensured committed funds were secure and available for payment to recipients once claims were submitted.

Recipients valued the variety of eligible project categories as well as the options available for the size and scope of the projects. This flexibility allowed recipients to obtain funding for projects that were critical to them based on their individual needs and context.

CSIF supported projects of high financial value that benefited large portions of the population (urban centres, major tourist destinations, etc.) while also funding smaller yet critical infrastructure (drinking water projects, broadband, etc.) in areas of lower population density. BIF supported a variety of projects – new traffic lanes, approaches and bridges, new processing facilities, and the implementation of modern technologies – which addressed various needs at Canada's major border crossings.

Information technology

The Shared Information Management System (SIMSI) is an information technology system that is used by the Department and funding partners to support policy and program management activities. When it was first developed, SIMSI was used in the context of managing Infrastructure Canada Program (ICP) projects. The ICP program funded numerous, relatively small-scale projects (approximately 4,000). After ICP, INFC adapted SIMSI to be used to manage large-scale infrastructure projects under both CSIF and BIF. The complexity related to these projects increased the maintenance requirements for the system.

In June 2013, the INFC Internal Audit Directorate concluded a review of INFC's Information Management – Data Quality Initiative. The review assessed data quality governance and data quality reporting, and identified opportunities for improvement related to, among other things, validating the factual accuracy of key data fields that are still being used in departmental reporting. Management agreed with the recommendations and implemented action plans in response to the review. The department has taken a number of steps to update and validate data accuracy including a large data clean-up initiative for all programs.

Furthermore, SIMSI is being replaced by a new system called the Program Information Management System (PIMS). This initiative requires new specifications from INFC users and recipients regarding data collection, monitoring and reporting.

Question #5: To what extent did CSIF and BIF achieve immediate outcomes?

As per the programs' Logic Models (see Table 1), two immediate outcomes are identified under CSIF and BIF programs:

1. Completed assets, which is a measure of completed infrastructure projects; and,
2. Investment leveraged, which is the dollar amount invested by recipients and other parties for the projects.

Completed assets

As of November 26, 2013, there were 83 projects under CSIF and 11 under BIF, for a total of 94 projects. For CSIF, 38 projects have been completed and 45 are in progress. Of the 45 that are in progress, two have been approved but have not yet started construction. The CSIF program also includes a direct transfer to Parks Canada for upgrades to the Trans-Canada Highway in Banff National Park. The BIF program also includes two projects with direct transfers to Canada Border Service Agency (CBSA) with one related to physical infrastructure and the other related to software.

All BIF projects were funded under the category of "physical infrastructure." As of November 26, 2013, six  BIF projects have been completed and five are at the implementation phase. The following table describes the detailed status of CSIF and BIF projects.

According to the project and program information from the SIMSI database, CSIF and BIF programs both demonstrated progress toward the completion of assets. At the time of the evaluation, 44 of the 94 CSIF and BIF projects have been completed or closed, which represents 47 percent of all CSIF and BIF projects. A list of completed CSIF and BIF projects is included in Annex A.

Finally, when a project is completed, the recipient has to provide all required information to proceed with the final claim payment and close-out of the project. In fact, the recipient is required to submit the final report, including all information required under the agreement no later than one year after the completion of the project. In some circumstances, delays may occur in submitting the final report in a timely manner to INFC. In these cases, INFC would hold back the final claims payment and reprofile the funding to future years.

Cost-sharing and Investment leveraged for Question #5

CSIF and BIF projects are funded by the federal government under a cost-sharing arrangement. As such, all parties share the financial responsibilities and risks to a certain extent. In general, the recipients (project proponent and its partners) are required to match or exceed the federal contribution amount for a project, with some exceptions. For most investment categories, such as highways, transportation, tourism, water and wastewater sector, INFC contributes a maximum of 50 percent of the eligible project costs. Exceptions were made for the Advanced Telecommunications and Broadband category, and for Northern Infrastructure projects, where the federal contribution can be up to 75 percent.

Before understanding the investment leveraged outcome, we first examined the general investment landscape for the funding program. Table 8 uses data from SIMSI to depict a summary of the cost-sharing trend for CSIF and BIF projects. It illustrates, by category, the lowest and the highest federal contribution, as well as the median and average federal contribution.

Table 8: Percentage cost-shared funding for CSIF and BIF projects from INFC, by investment category

	Highway or rail (CSIF)	Local transportation (CSIF)	Tourism or uban development (CSIF)	Water and Wastewater Treatment (CSIF)	Advanced Telecommunications & High-Speed Broadband (CSIF)	Northern Infrastructure (CSIF)	All projects (CSIF)	Physical Infrastructure (BIF)
Lowest	16%	23%	8%	18%	17%	48%	8%	22%
Highest	50%	50%	50%	50%	75%	50%	75%	50%
Median	49%	33%	40%	33%	52%	50%	43%	50%
Average	42%	36%	36%	37%	56%	49%	41%	44%

Overall, the final proportions for CSIF and BIF cost-sharing fall within the funding conditions of the programs. The highest leveraging effect was for a project in the tourism or urban development category where INFC's portion was 8 percent. The highest INFC contribution as a percentage of project funding was 75 percent for a broadband category project. The median funding proportion for CSIF projects was 43 percent with the average project funding at 41 percent of the total eligible cost. This is well below the 50 percent threshold applied to most project categories with the exception of broadband and northern infrastructure projects.

Specifically for the BIF program, the cost-sharing ranged from 22 percent to 50 percent. The majority of the projects (6 out of 11) were cost-shared at 50/50 as the median was 50 percent. The average of the INFC project contribution was 44 percent, again below the threshold limit.

The investment leveraged is a function of the required cost-sharing provision for all projects. In the program terms and conditions, investment leveraged is defined as "the amount of funding leveraged from partners for approved projects." Essentially, it is the total amount of funding that is contributed by the project proponent and its non-federal partners. Table 9 summarizes the total investments by the federal government and the project proponents as investment leveraged.

For the CSIF program, INFC contributed 34 percent of the projects' funds while the project proponents contributed 66 percent. Thus, for every federal government dollar, CSIF leveraged $1.94 for a total of $7.8 billion.

For BIF, the total federal contribution was 43 percent and the contribution by other funding partners was 57 percent. For every dollar, the federal government leveraged $1.31 for total of $683 million.

It should be noted that calculations for funding leverage are based on estimated project costs agreed upon in the funding agreements, and it is possible the amount of funding leveraged at the end of project construction is higher than these estimates. However, the final project costs are not always received by INFC following completion of the project.

In addition to using leveraged funding as a performance metric, it is also a requirement of compliance to the cost-sharing provision. The only official documents where explicit targets for leveraged funds were found were in the DPRs and the Reports on Plans and Priorities (RPP). INFC reported on the CSIF and BIF investment leveraged as part of its 2009-10 and 2011-12 DPRs. In these reports, the performance metrics for investment leveraged varied with respect to the target measurement. Where the 2009-10 report suggested a target of the "amount of dollars leveraged from other partners at least equal to federal funding", the 2011-12 report had a target of "100%". Definitions for these targets are inconsistent and may lead to confusion when it comes to understanding leveraging. As well, the DPRs are not clear on whether the target is based on the final project financial statements or on original budgets as indicated in the contribution agreements.

Question #6: To what extent did CSIF and BIF achieve intermediate outcomes?

As per the logic models of CSIF and BIF (see Table 1), there are three intermediate outcomes which are:

• A competitive economy;
• A clean environment; and,
• Liveable communities.

The evaluation found that these outcomes are the expected changes that could occur over the longer term. A discussion on these outcomes can be found in Question 7.

The evaluation also found reference to expected outcomes in the programs' Terms and Conditions. According to these documents, projects were approved under a specific investment category because they aligned with the objectives of the investment category and the project results would demonstrate the associated expected outcomes for the category. As part of the evaluation, these expected outcomes were used in the assessment of progress towards the intermediate outcomes (see Table 10) as they were found to be consistent with results reported by recipients. An overview of infrastructure funded and built by CSIF and BIF, along with some of the results reported per investment category is found in Annex B.

Program monitoring of outcome data

The CSIF and BIF programs rely on self-reported performance data from recipients which is collected throughout the duration of the CA. The data is collected from annual reports, AMC meetings, and communications with recipients. As the most general terms of the CAs terminate shortly after the last payment has been processed, recipients no longer have an obligation to report on results including performance data. This makes it a challenge to measure the intermediate outcomes, as not all projects were able to demonstrate intermediate outcomes immediately upon the completion of the infrastructure project. However, in the review of the projects' annual progress reports, it was noted that nearly half of the project recipients (42) reported on some form of outcome-related results which were observed immediately upon project completion. The results are aligned with the intermediate outcomes as described in the Terms and Conditions, and indicate progress towards intermediate and long-term changes.

The evaluation found that some data collection practices are in place but since information on project benefits is requested during or just after the completion of the projects, in most cases, there is insufficient time for intermediate outcomes to materialize.

Program results demonstrated for CSIF

During the evaluation, it was noted that some CSIF projects in some investment categories had data that was more readily available immediately following the end of project construction, such as projects in the water and wastewater, tourism, highway and rail and local transportation categories. It was also noted that certain recipients had collected information on project results. For example, not-for-profit recipients and entities that were formed only for the duration of the project had readily available data on results and outcomes as they were reporting to other stakeholders as well.

Program results demonstrated for BIF

At the time of the evaluation, BIF projects had been funded only under the Physical Infrastructure Category and not under the Intelligent Transportation System Infrastructure or Improved Analytical Capacity investment categories.

Upon review of the BIF projects and the results to date, it was not possible to fully substantiate that BIF is progressing towards achieving its intermediate outcomes, as mentioned in the Terms and Conditions. This is partly due to the limited availability of outcome-related data at the time of the evaluation, and because many external factors including the economy, national security, political climate, and weather conditions can significantly impact the flow of people and trade between Canada and the United States of America at surface border crossings.

It was reported during interviews with recipients, that BIF projects are improving the capacity for processing increased traffic volumes at major border crossings. According to the limited number of recipients and FDPs interviewed, there is a perceived improvement to the flow of trade and people across the borders, and to the security and safety monitoring at these border crossings. Recipients indicated that, in their views, improvements such as lane expansions and dedicated truck lanes have resulted in a reduction in queuing time, accidents and bottle necks on key highways and border approaches as well as reduced traffic congestion in near-by communities. Furthermore, technological improvements allow for border security activities to occur more rapidly.

Data received from CBSA¹³ indicates that since 2007, there has been an upward trend in traveler and commercial traffic across the major border crossings. Despite the increase in volume, border wait time standards have consistently been met for both types of traffic at participating border crossings. Though results cannot be solely attributed to the BIF-funded projects, this could suggest that participating border crossings have improved capacity and technology for processing traffic.

Question #7: To what extent did CSIF and BIF contribute to their long-term outcomes?

There is indication that the programs are making progress towards achieving the long-term outcomes of a strong economy, clean environment and livable communities. A literature review¹⁴ was conducted to establish whether infrastructure investment, in general, would contribute to the economy, the environment, and communities and to support whether CSIF and BIF projects are resulting in benefits that align with these long-term outcomes.

External research was found to support the underlying program theory that infrastructure investments, in general, are linked to long-term improvements in these areas.¹⁵ When recipients were asked to describe the benefits derived from their projects, many provided examples of results that mirror those found in the research.

It is important to note that the links to economic outcomes are strongly supported, whereas the links to environment and community outcomes have a smaller body of evidence and are more specific to the type of infrastructure investment.

• Economy: According to the literature review described above, research has shown that investment in infrastructure can stimulate economic activity such as attracting new businesses, creating and maintaining employment, and increasing a country's Gross Domestic Product.
• Environment: There is much less support in the literature for general infrastructure investment improving the environment. Considering this, the environmental outcome link is relevant only for CSIF wastewater projects, the one category that had explicit environmental objectives. The link from the other investment categories to long-term environmental outcomes is less probable.
• Communities: Investment in infrastructure has been known to create benefits for communities, and these benefits often go beyond the specific project objectives. For CSIF, there have been many social benefits reported, but they are more common in certain categories than in others (e.g., local transportation, tourism, drinking water). This is consistent with external research that acknowledges the social impacts of infrastructure development as a form of non-financial return on investment.¹⁶

With regards to measuring long-term outcomes, many recipients and INFC personnel indicated that studies exist that can support the program theory. For example, studies which demonstrate that a widened highway results in lower collision rates and, in turn, creates long-term safety and efficiency benefits could be used to support that projects are on the right track to contributing to longer-term outcomes such as "liveable communities".