Paul Hillsdon and Nathan Pachal – two young transportation bloggers – have offered an option for funding transit in this region.
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I’ll post more from the document later, but here’s their summary:
Based on over a year’s worth of research, the Leap Ahead proposal provides a clear path forward on stalled transit expansion plans. If implemented, Leap Ahead would unlock $15 billion in economic benefits and provide rapid transit to every part of Metro Vancouver.
In line with regional and provincial priorities, Leap Ahead would fund the immediate construction of significant transit infrastructure including:
- UBC SkyTrain
- South Fraser LRT & B-Line
- Expo Line Upgrades
- SFU Gondola
- Marine Drive (North Shore) B-Line
- Hastings B-Line
- 41 Ave B-Line
- Hwy 7 B-Line
- Hwy 1 B-Line
- Hwy 99 B-Line
- 200 St B-Line
The Leap Ahead plan concludes that a 0.5% regional sales tax is the most comprehensive and affordable solution to fund the region’s share of the plan. Voter-approved regional sales taxes have been successfully introduced in Los Angeles, Seattle, and Denver for similar transit expansions. With a 2% decrease in the federal GST and 0.5% decrease in the PST over the last decade, there is room for the proposed sales tax. A 0.5% regional sales tax would amount to just $0.35 per day, per resident.
The Leap Ahead plan will:
- Provide $21.5 billion in economic returns and produce a net benefit of $15 billion for taxpayers
- Support 234,000 jobs over 30 yearsExpand the system from 65 to 138 rapid transit stations
- 33 times more than the $1 billion South Fraser Perimeter Road
- Nearly 4 times more than the proposed Enbridge Northern Gateway pipeline
- Introduce rapid transit to every part of the region including Surrey, White Rock, Langley, Maple Ridge & the North Shore
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My comment:
“Do not – repeat, do not – junk-click this document,” said Gordon Price who is the director of the City Program at Simon Fraser University. “This one you want to read. I’ve seen enough of these proposals to know that Pachal and Hillsdon and have a pretty realistic sense of what kind of transit system might make sense for our future, and an idea for funding that might have a realistic chance of passage.”
“Whether you care about the future of Metro Vancouver or just the short-term politics of transit funding and referenda, Pachal and Hillsdon have some ideas worth considering,” Price continued. “At this point, they may have the only ideas worth considering, since everyone else seems to be waiting for somebody else to lead. And they have.”
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The Sun’s coverage here.
The province has rejected a vehicle levy and carbon tax, and said any other funding sources must go to a referendum ahead of B.C.’s municipal elections next year.
The Leap Ahead plan suggests neither a vehicle levy nor road pricing are appropriate, “as drivers cannot be reasonably be asked to shoulder the entire burden without realistic transit options.”
Richard Walton, chairman of the mayors’ council, said while a “marginal increase in sales tax would provide a significant boost to transit in the region,” it doesn’t put the onus on those using the roads for people and goods movement.
“We cannot isolate planning and funding from the movement of people and goods,” he said.
The mayors’ council will meet with B.C. Transportation Minister Todd Stone next week to discuss funding options. Walton said while the question of sales tax may make it as part of a referendum question, he’s not sure the provincial government would be willing to accept it, noting unlike in the U.S., the sales tax here is a “critical component” in funding education and health care.
Walton also argued that 35 cents a day could be a hardship for some families, as this calculates to about $50 per month for a family of four.
“We did put it in there but it was not put in with the expectation this would be the prime source,” he said.
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UPDATE: Here’s 24 Hours coverage. Note in the comments how quick respondents turn the issue into one of TransLink’s competence.
First we need to address the idea that an increase of taxes is actually necessary. The BC transportation budget seems to absorb steady increases in road capacity – and only ever looks at road user fees when it comes to tolls on new bridges. Apart from the Port Mann Bridge, the province of BC managed to find money to widen Highway #1 from the Vancouver boundary to the Langley boundary – and the South Fraser Perimeter Road, without a referendum or any new taxes.
Secondly we need to ask why an ever more regressive tax system is supposed to be a good idea. We have seen a steady decline in the taxes paid by the wealthy, but a replacement of taxes by flat rate user fees that hit the poorest hardest. At the same time while the elite see their executive pay and bonuses increased, everyone else has had to survive on steadily declining real incomes.
We are supposed to accept unquestioningly the notion that the current government is the best suited to manage BC’s economy when all the available evidence illustrates their incompetence. The problems that beset Translink were all created by the provincial government. It is clear that the current arrangements are not working. The idea that they can be made to work by coming up with a different transportation plan and an increase in a sales tax to be applied in a limited geographical area should be subjected to a great deal more critical thought than has so far been applied.
Anyone can produce a transportation plan. After all we all have the ability to draw lines on a map. An integrated land-use transportation plan that is able to absorb an additional 1.2 million people by 2041 without increasing use of single occupant vehicles and has a hope of actually working requires more resources than this one.
I tend to agree. I like the plan but I think more thought needs to go into how it is financed. Like you said, the Province seems to find money for highway expansions. They should divert that money into public transit, a much better investment.
Having said that, I would vote in favour of this proposal if low-income people can be exempted from the sales tax. At this point I just want to get on with it and start building out the system.
Stephan, for better or worse (and this is definitely for worse) the issue has been framed this way by our wonderful premier. The only hope transit has in the next while is to actually go out and win the referendum.
33 times more than the $1 billion South Fraser Perimeter Road
Nearly 4 times more than the proposed Enbridge Northern Gateway pipeline
33 times more what? 4 times more what?
Jobs. It’s written in the line above the two you quoted.
I guess that makes sense. These aren’t so much new bullet points as a continuation or sub-points from the line above. Thanks.
In the report, that is. It seems there was a problem copying and pasting into the summary on this web page.
While I agree with Stephen that we’re looking in the wrong places for answers, it’s nice to see someone come out with a larger than usual list of projects for consideration. I like that it includes more buses to help flesh out the network.
Some of the projects like the SFU gondola have already proven themselves worth doing just from a right-wing-friendly dollars and cents standpoint. Others are more forward looking with a much higher social component.
The sore thumb in the list of projects is the subway to UBC that doesn’t make any sense west of Arbutus and, in my mind, never will. UBC student/staff numbers have stopped growing and there is ample excess capacity in the current system to accommodate all the residential growth at UBC plus massive future population increases in Point Grey and Kitsilano.
The proposed routes are silly. Rapid transit should connect regional centres to other regional centres as directly as possible. These routes are sort of in the right parts of town, but they either aren’t direct and they don’t connect very well.
The north-south route in Langley meanders all over town like a community shuttle in suburbia. It wouldn’t be rapid transit because it wouldn’t be rapid. Put it on 200th.
The Hastings, Fraser Highway, and 41st Avenue lines have too few stops. Rapid transit should have arterial stop spacing (or at most at every other arterial) so that people can transfer to and from local buses. These lines are not well integrated with the rest of the transit network.
The North Shore Line has so many stops that it might as well be the 239. Worse, it maintains the unnecessary connection at Lonsdale Quay, which adds at least several minutes to all east-west trips in North Vancouver. The other key flaw in the existing North Vancouver bus network is the piss poor connection to the nearest regional centres, Brentwood and Metrotown, over the Second Narrows Bridge.
The Surrey LRT network has a lower benefit/cost ratio than B-Lines or a mix of B-Lines and SkyTrain. It’s worse transit because it adds an unnecessary transfer midway along what should be just one line.
2 caveats:
first the$250M is based on a 0.5% HST tax base, which was wider than the PST, so it is reasonnable to think that 0.5% increase in PST could not raise as much.
secondly, the money raised foot only 30% of the bill (and is barely enough to pay for a UBC subway).
So basically, no need to discuss at length of the alignment of a very hypothetical 200th street rapid bus.
Beside it the exercise has lot of merits and the authors deserve to be congratulated.
The exercise alo illustrates a potential peril of the referendum:
Have to come with a more or less ill tought laundry list to please anyone…
endind up with inadequate solutions (to please the voters, more than to answer the transit needs),, which will burden the community with unmanageable operating and maintenance cost.
My problem with the regional sales tax plan is that is does not address, in any way, shape or form, demand management issues. Why not combine the RST with some sort of congestion pricing scheme, to flatten out our peak traffic flows at the bottlenecks, perhaps delay the need for the next multi-billion dollar bridge/tunnel/freeway, and generate some funds for new/expanded transit? If you don’t look at ways to address mode split and peak flows, you’re just going to be adding to the list of next-gen Port Mann style projects.
Yes, look at ways like RST to generate consistent funding, but also seek ways to influence commuter behaviour. The “Leap Ahead” document quickly dismisses road pricing, which I believe is a major flaw in their thinking.