From Elwin Mowry in Tri-Cities Now:
TransLink is not a monument. It is a people mover. Bare necessities should be considered and not millions of tax dollars for beautification of stations which does not provide any return to us.
.
The people won.
That’s right, Elwin, the people of Vancouver can only afford and are satisfied with a second-rate transit system; they don’t want anything that doesn’t provide a ‘return’ – like beauty. Frankly, why do we put up with that beauty crap in any of our civic budgets?
So, is that what the referendum is doing to us: redefining Vancouver as a self-satisfied city of the second rate? Or as a letter-writer just above Elwin noted:
The image of Vancouverites as green and progressive is a hoax.
The leaders of this region and province – and not just the political ones – have a limited time left to establish which image will prevail. If they care.
Yes, a beautiful station is better than an ugly one. The question is: ” Who is paying for it?” and with the recent $20/h living wage announcement by the City of Vancouver tax payers are very weary throwing even more money at already overpaying governments. How about some serious wage constraints or more outsourcing of city jobs ? No wonder the Transit referendum was voted down due to this excessive waste of tax payers’ money !
Civil servants are making our like bandits: http://www.cfib-fcei.ca/english/article/7290-public-sector-workers-oped.html says this study by the folks who pay for it: independent businesses.
That is the elephant in the room around transit investments, or any of the overpaying municipal, provincial or crown entities/corporations. It is not restricted to TransLink or the City of Vancouver, of course. BC Liquorstores, BC Ferries, ICBC, … the public is fed up with throwing more money at these entities.
We chose higher salaries over beautiful stations with art, Gord … unfortunately !
Thomas’ solution is to pay city workers so little that they are forced to [a] live in a micro-suite, [b] move to former farm land in Langley and commute 2 hours/day or [c] move to Ontario.
Free enterprise expends huge amounts of effort improving efficiency, but when it comes to transporting the nation’s citizens they haven’t got a clue.
What is efficient about each of 10,000 people being forced to drag themselves and 2 tonnes of metal, glass and plastic into the city each day where parking said 2 tonnes each wastes many hectares of land or hundreds of millions of dollars if stored underground?
Travel by single occupancy vehicle is the least efficient means of transportation ever invented and long distance commuting the least efficient use of time, materials and land.
Part of me does wonder if the referendum signals a broader decline in the history of Vancouverism, assailed on multiple fronts by rising home costs, popular resistance to density, and a general loss of momentum since the 2010 Olympics. In this view — e.g. Pete McMartin’s column — the ambivalence of senior government is seen more as a catalyst of the referendum loss than a direct cause, the vehicle by which an underlying suburban impulse could vent frustration with the branded development policy. In short, that Metro Vancouver isn’t really that different from other North American cities once you step outside planning circles and friendly Lotusland ridings. As one comment in the Sun put it, ” People want cars. They want good roads. They do not want to be told to take a bus by some holier than thou types who condemn drivers’ legitimate choices. WE are Vancouver. We drive. We also vote.”
This idea will be tested in political backrooms over the coming months. If regional funding and transit governance does simply founder in the post-referendum aftermath, and even the political class can’t come to a consensus, then we have to worry that the Regional Growth Plan is coming apart and that Vancouverism will withdraw toward individual municipalities. I’m less concerned about the City of Vancouver, and more concerned about the coordinated application of policy that started back with the Livable Region plan.
That quote really bugs me. It’s basically the same adolescent-boy dominance thing of “whatever doesn’t work for me should be eliminated”. Since driving works for them, no other mode should be allowed to exist. “I’m only attracted to white girls so… kill all the Asians”. It goes on from here. We’ve all seen it before. Get one of them behind the wheel of a truck and watch out anyone in front of them who isn’t also in a big truck.
Another way to look at the vote is that about half of Vancouver (49%) did vote yes. This means that the story isn’t over. We do not want to now build inner city freeways and force everyone to buy a car and use it for ever trip. There’s a lot more going on here.
I think we are over analysing the result. I do believe BC people generally want better transit and care for the environment that will lead to better health.
The province does not want to be held accountable for better transit. They created a separate bureaucracy called Translink to serve as a whipping boy, that will create a momentum to do nothing. The provinces strategy is working and it was brilliantly executed.