As expect, City Council has voted in favour of a new agreement with the Katz Group on the downtown arena project.

Council has voted to approve the revised framework for the design and construction of the Option A arena. #yegarena #yegcc

— Edmonton Arena Info (@EdmontonDT) January 23, 2013

The total project cost now sits just north of the $600M mark with the arena itself now costing $480M, up $30M from original estimates. The increased cost of the arena will be split down the middle between the City and the Katz Group. The City's portion is presumably coming from the magical CRL. Katz will be paying his portion by increasing the loan the City is taking out for him; that loan now sits at $115M and will be paid back with interest over 35 years.

Some other highlights of the new deal courtesy of Dean Bennett (@dlb51):

Big change from original deal: City will now be on hook for major repairs and renos to the arena, rather than the Oilers. #yegarena #yegcc

— Dean Bennett (@dlb51) January 23, 2013

Under new #yegarena deal, city would still get revenues, use of building for 1 month a year, but now can't use it for major events like CFR.

— Dean Bennett (@dlb51) January 23, 2013

In both cases the deal gets a little bit better for the Katz Group. I guess I shouldn't be surprised by this but it's disappointing to see Council refuse to standby a deal that was already bad enough.