More Transportation News…

Posted on . by Patrick Johnstone. Leave a comment.

A few interesting stories have arrived in the media this week involving TransLink, transportation planning, and tolls.

The tone of this story was surprising, especially when juxtaposed against the opinion piece that the editor of that same paper produced last month. The ”danger” facing the NFPR is that it is a bad idea that does not fit in our community. Indeed, unless TransLink comes back with something substantial to mitigate the traffic impacts on all of New Westminster, from Brunette to Queensborough, then this plan may indeed have to go away. I do not think that is something to fear, however, it is the new reality of transportation planning. Clearly, the UBE as proposed in December did not fit the bill; we need a better solution.

The days when you could plow freeways through neighborhoods ended in Vancouver in the 70’s; perhaps it will end for the rest of the North-of-Fraser area in the 10’s. The South-of-Fraser communities will have to come to their own epiphany about this, and there are groups trying to usher that day along, but I am afraid as long as Diane Watts and Kevin Falcon are in charge, they will be mired in asphalt.

The Mayor is back to talking about tunnels and tolls, which are all well and good, but this raises as many questions as it answers. Is a graded, 2-km long 4-lane vehicle tunnel the best way to spend $1 Billion? Will a tunnel serve the primary purpose of a goods movement corridor if it will not be permitted to transport dangerous goods? What will either end of the tunnel look like? How does this tunnel free up traffic at Queensborough Bridge (as Councillor Osterman was quick to point out last meeting as a significant part of New Westminster’s Traffic woes)? How long until the traffic expands to make the tunnel a congested, polluted mess?

I know Mayor Wright has a visionary streak in him, but I am afraid he is missing the point here. The most visionary approach to this problem is not to engineer some white elephant solution that has proven time and time again in places across the globe to not solve the problem of congestion. The visionary approach is to say “no”, to say that the livability of our City is too important to add more traffic to the mix.

Then I saw this article towards the “filler” pages of the Leader, which features The Minister of Transportation and the Mayor of Surrey trying to out-Conservative each other.

I’m all for sober second thoughts, but Mayor Watts is off the mark here. She wants a new bridge to support her continued unsustainable development based on last century’s “car in every garage” model, but she doesn’t want the poor beleaguered Surrey citizenry who choose an auto-based lifestyle to have to pay for the infrastructure to support it.

Her argument that Surrey bridges shouldn’t be tolled because Vancouver bridges are not tolled (which she christens a “fair tolling” policy) is simply ridiculous. It ignores the fact that she is pushing automobile-dependent development that will require bridges, while the City of Vancouver is reducing the need for bridges by building working alternatives, and by building more compact, complete communities. As we learned last year in Jerry Dobrovolny’s talk at the NWEP AGM, this resulted in significant decreases in cars entering and leaving the City, at the same time they enjoyed significant growth of both population and jobs.

Anyone care to contrast this with the Panorama Ridge area of Surrey? If that is how Diane wants to build her City, she can pay for her own @%&@$&* bridge.
Finally, there was this story about the perils of trying to predict traffic. I have never driven across the Golden Ears Bridge, but I have ridden a bicycle across it a few times. To me, it is a monstrosity connecting two automobile-oriented communities, and again wonder if some of that $800 Million (or $1.04 Billion, or $928.5 Million, depending on whom you ask) could have been used to build more sustainable transportation alternatives for two communities that desperately need them (Langley and Maple Ridge).

Seems the problem here is that TransLink wrote ambitious predictions about traffic load to get the PPP happening, only to be on the hook when their own predictions failed. Naturally cars are avoiding the tolls by driving around the long way. The comments in the CBC story demonstrate how people act irrationally when it comes to tolls. A commenter says it is “only 25 minutes” to drive around. and the gas cost is “not nearly that much”.

Google Maps tells us the trip from the 200th Street in Langley to downtown Maple Ridge is 16km by the Bridge, 42km by the Port Mann, for a difference of 26km. I suppose you could make that trip in 25 minutes, if it is 2am. Mid-day, you are looking at an hour at least. The average car sold in Canada gets between 7L/100km and 12L/100km, so fuel costs to avoid the bridge (at $1.10 a Litre) is between $2.00 and $3.00. The toll on the bridge? Between $2.80 and $3.90. I guess for some people, avoiding an hour in traffic is not worth a loonie. Problem is, these people are all going to drive through New Westminster over the Patullo once the Port Mann is tolled… today’s bad planners are tomorrow’s New Wesmtinster traffic crisis. 

The headline “taxpayers off the hook” is a severe case of spin. Although one might not catch this from how the news articles on this were written, TransLink is going to have to pay that $63.8 Million dollars to a private corporation, which goes curiously unnamed in the articles. It is almost like TransLink and Consortium that run the Bridge don’t want to mention the recipient of the sweetheart deal. I leave that for you to Google yourself. So Translink will “find the money” to pay for this shortfall, but make no mistake that it is all taxpayers’ money. It may come from other capital projects or from reserves, but that just means $63.8 Million less to pay for new buses, new SkyTrain cars, to fill the “Funding Gap” for Evergreen, or for building Wayne Wright’s dream tunnel down Royal Avenue.

Council to Translink: not so fast. -Now With Video!

Posted on . by Patrick Johnstone. 14 Comments.

Thanks to Matt Laird, you can all enjoy the video of Mondays’ UBE discussion at council. Now I’m making it easy to show how much I paraphrased. Note the twitchy, swarthy guy in the background behind Laird… he looks like a trouble-maker…

Once again, local rabble-rouser Matt Laird took his 5 minutes of allotted council time to keep the issue of the United Boulevard Extension out in front of council.

For those not paying attention, a motion came out of the Working Session on Monday, the essentially told Translink to come back with something better.

Long and short of it, Translink has again managed to put off the “deadline” for securing Federal funds for this project (proving once again that the “deadline” is more like a “justrestingline”), and will work with the City to see if they can find a solution to the Front Street part of the NFPR in time to make the UBE more tenable.

Contrary to some reports, this does not mean that the City has agreed to the UBE, only to keep their minds open and see what TransLink has to offer. This is (in my never humble opinion) the right tack to take. Lets not close our eyes to all offers, let’s see what they can come up with, then decide if the proposed solution improves out City.

The public opinion on this project is such that all 6 council members felt they had to comment on Laird’s delegation and the motion that went forward. For those who missed it, the entire session should be up by some time mid-week at Matt’s website: luther.ca/newwestcouncil. Here are my comments on their comments (of course, there comments are paraphrased from my notes at the meeting, please let me know if I mis-quote any of them!).

4:21, Councillor McEvoy: Is curious to see how Translink plans to improve traffic flow but not increase traffic volume.

This is a significant question, and perhaps cuts to the very heart of the matter. As anyone involved in transportation planning can tell you, traffic usually expands to fill the void. If we double traffic capacity on the NFPR, we can only expect traffic to double, resulting in an equal amount of congestion concomitant with increased noise, pollution, maintenance costs, etc. etc.

6:10, Councillor MacIntosh: Reminded us that the industrial area in Sapperton needs help, they are suffering from congestion and need to be able to move goods to survive. She also reminded us that the Federal Money being offered is intended to increase efficiency and safety of train operations (supported in this case by replacing a level crossing with an overpass). Finally, she made it clear the Translink will be evaluating various options, perhaps including a 2-lane bridge to replace the Bailey, or re-routing Braid industrial Area traffic through Coquitlam, where new road infrastructure is being built already.

These comments brought to my mind (as echoed by Laird), that the problem is commuter cars using our industrial roads as a shortcut, clogging them up so goods-carrying vehicles can not get through. Essentially, this is the same problem as “Rat Running” in the residential parts of Sapperton. It is not clear how this problem for our important industrial citizens will be solved by knocking down some of their businesses to make room for a road that will only serve to funnel more commuter traffic through the industrial area. This is suspiciously close to fighting fire with matches.

If the Feds and Railways have the goal of improving upon the level crossing, and the City’s goal is to make Braid Industrial Area more accessible, then these goals may not coincide with TransLink’s goal to build more roads and Coquitlam’s goal to improve traffic flow to the big box hell (and soon car-oriented development hell) that is United Boulevard.

10:39, Councillor Harper: Started by reminding us that this is a complex problem, and that there will not only not be a single answer, there is also not a single goal. He rhetorically asks if we have “address” truck traffic, then non-rhetorically answers in the affirmative. Harper seems to be the one most in favour of the existing offer from Translink, as he lists the issues relating to the existing situation on Brunette and Columbia, but he fails to close the loop on how any of these problems will be solved by the UBE (although he alludes to “mitigation”) or how building a 4-lane freeway amounts to “reclaiming out waterfront”. He finishes by questioning how long before we have another “opportunity” to get $65 million in Federal money to build our way out of this problem.

After my erlier comments about conflicting goals, I think all of Council should, at least, have a single goal: to make New Westminster a more livable, more prosperous, and more sustainable community. I look back at the Mayor’s annual address, and I see one goal laid out again and again: Make the City more livable. If there are any other goals here, let’s get them out on the table.

I’m not sure how one “addresses” truck traffic. The way I see it, we have three options: have more, have the same amount, or have less. The things that make any single truck safer, less polluting, or quieter are outside the City’s jurisdiction. All we really can control is the number or trucks, and we control that by building the infrastructure to accommodate them. You can argue that we need to build more capacity to accommodate more trucks, but don’t then complain about increased noise and pollution. You can argue that we need to reduce truck traffic, but if you do this, you had better be ready to work with our industrial and commercial citizens to make sure you don’t drive (ha ha) them our of business or to another jurisdiction. The third option is to not build more capacity. This will, of course, require you to do both: :mitigate the already significant pollution and noise issues, and work with our business partners to make the existing infrastructure more efficient for them. In many ways, this is the most difficult option, but might represent the best option for a City like New Westminster.

Finally, the $65 million is a red herring argument. That is not Federal Stimulus money, it is money earmarked for Asia-Pacific Gateway improvement. If New Westminster along with it’s partners at the railway, Translink, and the Province find a way to free up train travel and increase level crossing safety, the money will be there. This is separate from the entire idea that we must do something because “someone else” will pay for a portion of it. That is not really visionary, especially when that “someone else” is actually us, the taxpayer. If it serves the community and other levels of Government are willing to contribute (Pier Park anyone?), then great. But if it doesn’t serve us, we should be responsible enough to say no thank you.

17:25,Councillor Osterman: Recognizes the traffic problem as a problem, citing traffic by the Columbia Square and 20th Street as good examples: “the system needs work”. He agrees that we need the long-term plan in place before we spend money unwisely. He is also of the opinion that New Westminster (and potentially all of Greater Vancouver) is on the “cusp”, but I didn’t really get the idea of what cusp he was speaking of…after all, cusps can be the top of a wave, or they can be the edge of a cliff…

It is interesting that the traffic problems Osterman outlines (primarily, his own hassles commuting in a single occupant vehicle to the airport and back, and trying to get to Council on time) are likely to be made worse by the UBE, and worse yet if the full 4-lane NFPR is built on Front Street. These projects will just move the traffic choke point to his neighborhood.

I think (and hope) he meant the cusp where a larger investment directed at public and alternative transportation will be required to make our Cities livable over into the next Century. This is the time when we start to seriously move away from building transportation infrastructure based on the individual automobile and start building it based on the realities of Peak Oil, Climate change, and what type of City we want to live in 10, 20, 50 years from now. Osterman cited European examples, and I concur that northern Europe is full of amazing cities with enviable transportation systems: Amsterdam, Copenhagen, Oslo, even London.

Imagine…

21:50, Councillor Cote: Surprised me by mentioning that he did not support the motion, as he feels strongly that the Patullo Bridge question must be answered at the same time as the NFPR question, the two solutions must happen hand-in-hand, and with the Patullo decision delayed until the fall, that cannot happen.

I can see both sides of this coin. Yes, ideally, the entire system should be dealt with holistically (and, uh, is sort of required to under CEAA, but I digress). However, the Patullo decision might just be out of TransLink’s hands, as Premier Falcon is going to want to cut the ribbon on that one at the most opportune time. So if Translink can run the numbers with each of the three most likely Patullo upgrade outcomes (refurbishing the existing bridge; replacing with a 4-lane bridge; replacing with expanded capacity) then the City may have something that can be fairly evaluated. Now, Cote surely knows more than I about the plans, as he sat through the TransLink presentation, and I am hearing about it third hand, so I am not going to be critical of him for his principled stand.

24:50, Councillor Williams: Had little to say, but going 6th, most of it had already been said, but she reminded us once again that the City willing to agree to anything unless the entire NFPR routing is dealt with concurrently.

Overall, Council’s position on this remains clear. Although there is a spectrum of views from the Councillors, they all reflect different approaches to the same point: The UBE is part of the NFPR, and we, as a City, will not accept the piecemeal management of this major regional route through the City.

It will be interesting to see what comes back in June. With the City Engineers working on the project with TransLink, they are unlikely to come back without something they can recommend to Council. If Matt Laird’s suggestion that the physical limits at several locations along the proposed NFPR routes will preclude the 4-lane truck highway some dream about, then we might be in for quite a fight in June.

Just in time for an election campaign.

Windows, part three.

Posted on . by Patrick Johnstone. Leave a comment.

Our window replacement project now complete, it is all over but the Blogging

Really, our choices were vinyl or wood. Aluminum had no real advantage, fiberglass was out of our price range, as were wood-clad or other complicated hybrid window styles.

So we did what most semi-informed consumers do, we delved into the marketplace.

Full disclosure here, Tig and I are bad consumers. By that, I mean we just don’t do the shopping thing well. To say we have high sales resistance is to downplay the problem. It is more that we rarely find anything worth buying. A trip to the Mall is something we avoid at all costs, as it fills us with what Hunter called “Fear and Loathing”. I simply do not enter the retail environment in the month of December. When one of us decides we need to buy something, say, a shirt for work, we steel our resolve and enter the fray, and rarely come out satisfied with our purchases, and more often walk out having bought nothing, realizing that we are not the target market for anything. The modern consumer experience is not designed for us, and we are not designed for it. So why force the issue?

So when Sssssalesmen start coming to our house with quarter-cuts of windows as samples and lots of glossy brochures, to do a few measurements and drop us an estimate with an abstract 5 digit number on it… this is usually a bad experience for all involved. I am not going to name any of the non-successful bidders, they live in their own window-sales Hell, may the Flying Spaghetti Monster have noodly mercy on their souls. Suffice to say, we saw them all, or a wide enough sampling so as to be statistically significant.

We asked a lot of questions, and some were better at answering them than others. The higher-priced people made compelling cases for rigidity of the vinyl, for higher numbers of void spaces in the window frames, for colour options, for muntin designs to match the heritage of our house.

The problem with vinyl becomes pretty clear: if you want a strong structure with lots of void space for thermal efficiency, there needs to be a big, thick window frame. Making that big, thick window frame fit into the pre-existing hole in the house, without getting into expensive and difficult mucking about with stucco and plaster and drywall, you start to lose significant window space. In a 1940 house with relatively small window space to start with, this becomes significant.

Also, vinyl, for all it’s flexibility in design, is kind of ugly. You can have pretty much any colour you want, but white is about the only colour offered (economies of scale limit the ability of these companies to extrude numerous colours locally). The size of some of our double-hung windows limited the ability of their relatively weak frames to support the structure; so many sssssales people pushed us to alternate styles that were less appealing. The design elements (muntin grilles, opening hardware, etc.) were generally cheap-looking and added on, and took more away from the look than they added.

Then there were uncertainties about the install. We had guys promise to do the total install of 19 windows in one day, “no problems”. That is a pretty bold promise to make in a 70 year old house after 2 minutes of looking at a window. It did not instill confidence that they would be taking utmost care or managing unforeseen issues with my best interests in mind. One test of this was to show the ssssssales person that crappy downstairs install I pointed out earlier. The range of reaction we got were telling. Some were aghast that anyone would slap a window in like that, while others basically said, yeah, it doesn’t look too bad, must have been a funny sized opening… you should maybe add a little silicone… . Needless to say, that quick-filtered many proposals (and, perhaps not paradoxically, those were generally the lowest bidders).

Another irritant was never really having an impression of how the windows in their glossy brochure would look in our house. Invariably, the ssssales guy would show up with a ¼ of a window so we could see the void spaces that made them so efficient, but rarely with a complete window. Some offered local references, and this lead to us wandering the streets of Queens Park and West end looking at (not through) innocent people’s windows. We also tried to go to any showrooms or warehouses so we could put our fingers on the actual product, see what it actually looks like. This caused some of the ssssales people discomfort, and some companies really didn’t have a showroom or display product (other than the ¼-cut window with all those wonderful void spaces!) to show. Is it just me, or is asking someone to spend 5 figures on a product they really haven’t seen a normal thing in sales?

After a couple of months, and more than a dozen sales folks, it seemed we were back to Square 1. Exploring the options for wood windows lead us to a couple of fairly large and well-regarded companies, and initial meetings looked good. We got to go to an actual showroom to look at actual windows, install options looked good. Unfortunately, being a relatively small project to some of these companies, it seemed options were limited. Not totally limited, but very cost limited. As these windows were manufactured in far-off places familiar only from Coen Brothers Movies, every little deviation from a “standard” size of install added up quickly. Wood manufacturing does not have the flexibility at the factory level that vinyl does.

Then we found a local company that seemed to get it. They made wood windows specifically for the heritage-home market, and their ssssales guy was also the owner, so he was interested in making us happy instead of his commission. He was also very straight-forward about what was and wasn’t possible in our house, he was realistic about what we could (and should) do. He was incredibly patient taking the time to answer our questions, but didn’t call us every day to try to close the sale. He was also asking a little more than we wanted to spend. But pretty soon in, Tig and I know we found our guy, we just needed to figure out how to get the windows.

Transportation news!

Posted on . by Patrick Johnstone. 11 Comments.

It seems that not all is silent on the transportation front.

Since the furor over the United Boulevard Extension erupted in December, causing Translink to delay plans and ask for their funding deadline to be extended until March, it has been pretty quiet around here. Here we are, halfway to the new deadline, and the public discussion of this issue has all but disappeared. Tenth to the Fraser has expended some energy trying to keep the discussion going in a productive way, with Chris Bryan’s well-considered column, and Matt Laird’s two-part analysis of the real issues with the grey-dotted-line-on-a-map referred to as the North Fraser Perimeter Road. But from Mayor, Council and TransLink? Silence.

That ended this week. We find out that discussions have been going on between TransLink and the City, and apparently, the City is not totally thrilled with where they are going.

This week in New Westminster Council, there were surprise discussions of these negotiations. Surprise, as they did not appear any of the Agendas produced for Monday’s Council meetings, so anyone actually interested in the subject would not know to show up (is this what Voice is complaining about?). Also surprise, as it seems most of the actual discussion took place in closed session, so we don’t have a full understanding of the process, but I will hit that issue later.

Anyone who is interested can download the video of the council meetings courtesy of local rabble-rousers and tech guru Matt Laird. The UBE topic comes up (unannounced, but apparently known to all present) around 1:30:00 on the recording.

Some of the context of the discussions is in the earlier Public Delegations from Dave Nicholson Mary Wilson, and (?) from Brow of the Hill talking about pedestrian safety in the City. As an aside, it is great around 0:35 minutes where Mary talked eloquently about how reactive responses to single pedestrian danger points is missing the point of making the entire transportation system friendlier and safer for pedestrians, to which Councillor Osterman comes back with a recollection of a single incident of pedestrian safety that they took care of…ugh… completely missing the very point Mary made so clearly. Even this was wiped from my consciousness 5 minutes later when Councillor MacIntosh blames pedestrians for wearing too much black… essentially blaming the victim for the crime of not being able to keep your 3000lb steel toy from running into them. I try not to be too critical of our elected officials, but that is a dimwitted comment to make.

Oh, and Councillor Harper referring to a popular search engine as “the Google” is funny.

Then it was on to the surprise UBE discussion. Right off the bat, I need to say that I recognize that negotiations involving potential real estate transactions, financial negotiations with other agencies, and some other fiscally-sensitive issues must be carried out in camera, and this is why the Local Government Act gives the City the power to hold in camera meetings. However, transparency in government is necessary, especially in election years. So here we have aspects of in camera sessions being brought to the public.

Long and short of it: Council, to their credit, said all the right things. They reiterate that their motion in December on the UBE stated that they would not endorse any UBE plans unless they include plans for the entire NFPR, from United Boulevard to New Westminster’s western borders. Apparently Translink brought some proposals to the City in a January 19th letter, and Council was not satisfied. According to Councillor Cote, it was really nothing new, and didn’t address the issues the City raised in December. Councillor McEvoy was even more vociferous, chiding TransLink for attempting to rush the City and for not performing appropriate public consultation back in the fall. I also like his clear message that New Westminster is only 7 square kilometres, all of it built out, and we do not have the free space to accommodate road expansion (This will do doubt be a major argument come Master Transportation Plan time).

Good news is that TransLink is supposed to be back for next weeks Council Meeting (the 14th), so if the UBE interests you, it wouldn’t hurt to show up. Oh, it’s budget night to, so fun all around.

Then there was this news that TransLink is considering not replacing the Patullo, but instead may just refurbish it. This “news release” was strange, in that there was no mention on the TransLink webpage, no obvious press release, just an article by Jeff Nagel for Black Press, and a story on CKNW (a cynic would say directed at Liberal supporters South of the Fraser two weeks before the Premier Falcon Coronation… uh… I mean Liberal Leadership Vote). Regardless, if this announcement marks a change in policy about the Patullo (either from the Province or from TransLink) then the earlier assertion by TransLink that the Front Street / NFPR works would be done as part of the Patullo project means that these changes are back to the drawing board.

This is actually good news for New Westminster. To potential of replacing the Patullo with a larger bridge with more lanes will be another UBE-type debate: increasing the capacity for cars to get into our City without concomitant infrastructure to deal with the traffic once it is in the City, resulting in more traffic, more congestion on our streets, more “rat running”, less pedestrian safety, and a less liveable city. The only difference is that this debate will include Diane Watts, which makes it louder.

Of course, traffic is already anticipated to increase significantly on the Patullo when the tolls for the Port Mann kick in, which has raised suggestions that the existing Patullo should be tolled as well to manage this issue, but that is another issue for another time

The Master Transportation Plan, Background

Posted on . by Patrick Johnstone. Leave a comment.

The City of New Westminster is currently working on a Master Transportation Plan. The process to update the City’s 10-year-old transportation planning document was initiated n 2010, and will hopefully be completed in 2011 (the plan has been delayed somewhat by “staffing changes” in City Hall). As I suggested at my year-end looking back/looking forward interview with the News Leader, the MTP should be the #1 environmental issue in New Westminster this year, as nothing will have more influence on the liveability of our City in the decades to come than this plan and its successful implementation. With the UBE Experience behind us (for now) and the NFPR breathing down our necks, the City needs to get it’s transportation priorities down, or decisions will be made without us.

So what is a Master Transportation Plan? It is the high-level guidance document that outlines what the goals, priorities, and needs of the City are in relation to its transportation infrastructure. Usually, it is a high-level document, which creates broad guidelines, as opposed to providing details, it is more likely to state that all sidewalks should be accessible to people with disabilities, instead of detailing the dimensions and slope of the perfect curb cut. It sets guidelines that the engineers and planners can use to do their work. Think about the MTP as the Constitution: it doesn’t create laws, but all laws must be compared to it to see if they comply.

Once the MTP is created and accepted, then every transportation project in the City can be assessed compared to that document. If the project meets the goals and priorities of the Plan, it is easy to approve. If it doesn’t, then the project has to be adapted. In theory, this assures that the complex integrated system that is the “transportation infrastructure” all works together, instead of being a slapped-together patchwork. The end result should be lower building and maintenance costs due to efficiencies, reduced overlap or competition between projects, and ultimately, a less expensive, better organized transportation network.

So perhaps you can see why it is so important to the City that the MTP is right, and how important it is to the liveability of the City.

The big issues are outlined on the City’s website on Transportation Planning: pedestrian safety, cycling infrastructure, transit access and service, the volume of regional traffic through the City, air quality, and noise. Further, the City states that the MTP “will focus on principles of sustainability, social liveability, environmental stewardship and economic prosperity”.

This is a promising start, as it seems to put the emphasis on sustainable transportation choices, increased safety for all road (and sidewalk) users, and increased liveability.

There are two other documents that are already available from the City that will provide guidance for the MTP. They are the (now slightly dated) “Official Community Plan”, and the “Livable City Strategy“. Both of these documents make many of the same points: sustainable transportation alternatives (walking, transit, bicycles) need to be encouraged, and building more roads to accommodate more traffic will only result in more noise, more pollution, and more congestion.

Over the next couple of months, I hope to Blog quite a bit on the MTP process. The NWEP Transportation Group is also watching to see how it develops. It is the documents above that are going to provide a framework for the discussions. If you are interested in the topic, you might want to read them. And you should be interested, both because it is important for the City, and because the City will be looking for public input into the plan, through consultations. We don’t know what those consultations will look like, but it would be great to be informed when the call comes.

There are also many examples of Transportation Plans available on line, most Cities have them. Here are links to a couple of interesting ones:
Vancouver (showing how “Gregor’s Bike Routes” were planned in 1997).
City of North Vancouver (A city with similar demographics and challenges as New Westminster)
Coquitlam (as cautionary example).
Burnaby (our closest neighbour)

The end of civilization will be Grāpe® flavoured.

Posted on . by Patrick Johnstone. 1 Comment.

The Clean Bin movie was great. Well attended, and a well-shot and entertaining movie with surprisingly high production value and humour. The filmmakers were friendly and engaging, and had a nice Q&A session after. It was a good evening.

A few people wondered how the film topic (reducing trash) meshed with the food security ideals of a local Farmers Market. In the film the link became obvious. Through trying to reduce excess and non-recyclable packaging, the filmmakers ended up buying more food at the local Farmers Market, while being exacerbated by trying to purchase food at the local SupraMarket without packaging. They also found themselves eating better and saving money, as whole foods replaced processed food in their diet.

Which brought me to think about a book I read a few years ago, ”The End of Food” by Thomas Pawlick. The book begins with his description of the modern tomato, closer to a tennis ball than it is to the tomato that previous generations loved. Due to selective breeding for characteristics like shelf life, durability for shipping, predictable ripening time, and size, the consumer tomato has undergone evolutionary change. Unfortunately, flavour and nutrition are not two things that are selectively bred towards. Therefore, tomatoes are puffed-up, bland, tough, nasty brutes compared to the Tomatoes of our parent’s youth. Worse, according to the USDA’s own reports, the modern tomato contains significantly less vitamin A, vitamin C, calcium, potassium and protein than they did 50 years ago. They do, however have 65% more fat, and more than twice as much sodium as they did in the 1960s.

There is no doubt that factory food production and delivery has made more kinds of food available to more people. Unfortunately, the actual food is commonly less healthful than it once was.

That said, I am not a big believer in the “organic food” movement. The term “organic” is so fuzzy as to be meaningless, and too often people shut off their critical thinking and assume “organic” means it is good for you or more ethical, in the same way we have (still do?) with “whole grain” or “Fat Free”. If there is any diet idea I can agree with, it is Michael Pollen’s “Eat food, not too much, mostly plants”. As such, I spend most of my time in the grocery store around the outside walls, where the veggies, meat, and other food is, and away from those inner aisles where the food-inventions in boxes-in-foil and foil-in-boxes are shelved. As long as we have produce, we won’t starve.

Until I saw the Grapple® at my local Cave-in Foods. There, in the fruit section, between BC and Washington state apples of various variety, is a plastic-packaged 4-pack of apples. Intrigued by the wasteful packaging choice, I was horrified to read what the product really was.

An artificially flavoured apple…

Apples are, hands down, my favourite food. I eat one every day if I have access. Hate apple juice, like apple pie, can give or take dried apples, but absolutely love a fresh, crisp apple. Granny Smith (when crisp), Macintosh (when you can get them from the fruitstand in Keremeos) or Fuji are my favourites. It never occurred to me that impregnating an apple with artificial grape flavour would be an improvement.

Don’t get me wrong: I like grapes. Grapes are great in all their forms, except the form of an apple, a banana, a grapefruit.. any other form of fruit.

Artificial Grape Flavour is great for getting children to take cough medicine, but an asinine way to get a kid to eat an apple. It is like mixing single malt scotch with Grape Tang, I don’t care if you like it better that way, it is wrong to the core.

What does this say about our society? That we add artificial flavour to fruit in the produce section? Or that people are actually shelling out $5 for a plastic-clamshell 4-pack of apples with artificial flavour when they can get 6 apples and a pound of grapes for $5?

I wept for mankind.

On Farmers Markets and Clean Bins

Posted on . by Patrick Johnstone. Leave a comment.

The Royal City Farmers Market is one of the Jewels in the crown of the revitalized Royal City, and it is just the kind of grass-roots community building organization that the NWEP exists to support. The RCFM has grown and prospered to such a scale that it hardly resembles the nascent organization that appeared only a couple of years ago. Current RCFM President Andrew Murray and a core team of volunteers and staff have made the Market a weekly ritual for Queens Park, Downtown and Brow residents, while attracting customers and hangers-on from Sapperton the West End, and other parts of the City.

The introduction of monthly indoor Winter Markets last year was rewarded with great crowds, as the combination of preserves, prepared foods, crafts made up for the lack of variety of farm-fresh local veggies and fruit we are used to in the summer.

Last year’s Fundraiser at the Heritage Grill was most memorable for the apologies the staff and volunteers were handing out for the overwhelming response. The place was so crowded, that it took longer than usual to get drinks or the meals prepared. But no-one was complaining as the music and the company were great, as was the charity auction.

This year, the RCFM folks have decided to spice up their Societies-Act -mandated Annual General Meeting with a screening of the film “The Clean Bin Project”. I haven’t seen the film, but am aware of the filmmakers and their project to go without producing waste for one year, as the Glenbrook North Zero Waste Challenge folks were all over the story.

Apparently the movie is inspirational and refreshing in that the do-gooders in the central role don’t take themselves to seriously, or even try to suggest this is a viable option for most people. It is just intended to be an eye-opener to a subject that we all take for granted:

The Clean Bin Project – Trailer from Grant Baldwin Videography on Vimeo.

So, go to the RCFM AGM, and see what a dedicated group of community activists can create.

See the Clean Bin Movie screening, and see what a couple of dedicated local activists can achieve.

Support the next RCFM Winter Market, on February 12th.

Force of Nature Review

Posted on . by Patrick Johnstone. 5 Comments.

I am not a movie reviewer (I think Machete might be the best movie I saw in 2010, but I was real tired at the time), but here goes.

The movie was, much like its subject, interesting as much for its flaws as its message.

The film combined footage from Suzuki’s “Legacy Lecture” tour stop in Vancouver with biographical vignettes, which blended archival photos and film with footage of Suzuki visiting those places most important in his 75-year life.

And it is interesting to see the things that influenced his development into the Icon we all recognize. He begins with the bombing of Pearl Harbour when he was 5, which he describes as the pivotal moment in his life, as it set the course of his 1942 internment, his 1946 relocation across the Rockies, and his growing up as an outsider in a small Ontario town, and the complex relationship with his home that he in part inherited from his father. He discusses his introduction to research science, benefiting from the “Sputnik Moment” recently referenced in Obama’s State of the Union address (and hilariously bungled in Sarah Palin’s rebuttal), and he eventual disillusionment with research while immersed in the counter-culture of late 1960 Vancouver. We see his introduction to broadcasting, and his discovery of the huge range his voice could have, and how he leveraged this into activism, most notably in the preservation of pristine watersheds in the Haida Gwaii.

It is an interesting journey, and he has had a remarkable life. But there is no attempt here to sugar coat his history, or his person. His dedication to research and inability to give his wife and children the attention they needed cost him a marriage. The film also didn’t shy away from showing the now silly-looking pot-philosophy trip he was groovin’ in the 60s. To a scientist, his arguments around the responsibility of research scientists in a world where all science shares ideas and one could not control how one’s research is used are intellectually weak. It also seems to be an argument that belies his current ideas about how we need, as a species, to learn. But few of us would like to be judged by the ideas we formulated in our 20s while under the influence of premium Mexican sensimilla.

Which brings me to one of the problems I have always had with Suzuki as a spokesperson for science. He too often gets his science mixed up with his spirituality. He does this here again with his blending of the real science of the Big Bang (which he irritatingly calls an “explosion”, when it is nothing of the sort) and the formation of matter with “love” as an attractive force on par with gravity. Philosophers can use science, and scientists can have philosophies, but muddying them up like that in the guise of science education does a disservice to both, and unfairly lumps too much pseudo-science in with true insight.

The same complaints cannot be used when he talks about sustainability, though. His message is not in the least bit muddied there. We are using resources faster then they can be replaced, and we are the last generation that will (for example) have a Bluefin Tuna Auction. Humans do not exist outside of, or apart from, the environment, we are immersed in it so intimately that the exhaust from our cars goes into our lungs and mixes with our cells. We become the exhaust from our cars, the neurotoxins in our pesticides, the plastic in our seas.

The filmmakers made some interesting choices. They didn’t interview anyone about Suzuki, other than Suzuki (with the sole exception of a 10-second sound bite from his current wife). Some of the people around him are completely absent, including his “best friend” (who is briefly mentioned but not seen), or his political allies and detractors. This sometimes gives it the vibe of a vanity project, and does little to dispel the common idea that Suzuki suffers from in inflated self-image, They also insisted on using a strange fast-zoom-in technique, presumably to create emphasis that may have been lacking from Suzuki’s relatively unexpressive visage during an important part of a discussion, or maybe it was to try to make him look like Batman. Regardless, it was distracting at first, irritating the 20th time.

Overall, the movie was effective. Suzuki is an interesting character, whose flaws as a person or as a scientist do not take away from the essential truth of his message: the planet has limited carrying capacity, and the way we measure value in our economy is not the way we measure value in our lives. It is this disconnect on the definition of “value” that is resulting in the destruction of the very biosphere that sustains us.

Movie Night

Posted on . by Patrick Johnstone. Leave a comment.

Love him or hate him, you cannot deny his impact. There has been no one more strident and resolute about environmental issues in Canada in the last 25 years than David Suzuki. To truly understand the impact he has made, just surf over to the Right Side of the Internet, and see how much rage and vitriol is directed towards him by the Climate Change Denier crowd, by the CBC haters, and by pretty much anyone who thinks Corporations matter more than Cooperation.

Tonight at 7:30pm at the Massey Theatre, there will be a showing of an award-winning biographical documentary about Suzuki, his life and times, and the experiences that made him such a Force of Nature.

Even if you disagree with him, it is worthwhile going to see the film. Partly because, as Sun Tzu says, you must know your enemy. However, it is also a chance to support the New Westminster Arts Council, as this is part of their monthly “Last Monday at the movies” series.

See you there!

The MUCF open house

Posted on . by Patrick Johnstone. Leave a comment.

Thursday, the City held a public open house to garner feedback on the new Multi-Use Civic Facility, planned for the 700 block of Columbia Ave.

It was remarkably well attended, and there were lots of staff about to answer questions, but I liked that they were there to ask questions as well. I was approached more than a half dozen times with staff members asking what I think, or if I had input: you get the sense they really wanted to hear from us (note to TransLink: hire New Westminster Planning to facilitate your next open house, I’m sure their rates are reasonable). It was also a great idea to hold the open house at the Westminster Club, on the 7th floor overlooking the site where the MUCF will be built.

The project is somewhere beyond the visioning stage, but the design is clearly not quite done. The model was balsa wood, and was good for getting a sense of the mass and layout of the building, but not an idea of the real appearance. There were several design-type drawings, but no complete picture of what the building will look like (more on this below). However, I walked out of there impressed with the concept, and excited about what it means to downtown New Westminster.

There is much to like. With the completion of the commercial part of the Plaza 88 development, there are going to be big changes in this neighbourhood. Movie theatres and restaurants right on the Skytrain station are a potential game-changer. This will be the most accessible movie theatre for the Lougheed Mall, and SFU crowds, and will even be easier to get to than Guildford for a lot of people in the new Surrey Centre. The food, drink, and entertainment options on the street immediately adjacent that development are going to have a huge impact on the success of the Columbia Street renewal, drawing in pedestrians and shoppers. This building will be the keystone.

The restaurant space on the corner of 8th and Columbia is a smart move. No names of potential tenants are being mentioned (for obvious reasons), but a popular mid-scale local chain (think Earls, Cactus Club, etc.) would be an obvious fit. It is clear they want the restaurant to have street appeal: open window space and a large patio to bring the restaurant out onto the street. My only complaint is the plans have the deck on the 8th street side, where we really need it on Columbia if we want to connect to the rest of the businesses in the area, from Waves to the Heritage and all the way up to Brooklyn. Restaurants are about the only business (other than wedding shops apparently) that benefits from having more competition in he neighbourhood. The deck/patio will also lead to more engagement of Hyack Square, and we will have to wait to see what happens with the third corner at Columbia and 8th. I can’t help but feel the Sally Ann is going to increasingly be out of place on this new “entertainment core”.

Click to zoom in

The planned theatre space in the MUCF also looks great, a mid-sized and very convertible space. Small concert and performance space is lacking in the City, as our existing theatres downtown seem to be limited to single-use only (tickle and giggle, respectively). At 1/3 of the seating capacity, this will not threaten the (New! Improved! Eventually!) Massey Theatre, but the potential for smaller arts productions, for local music, and for screening space for indy films and docs is pretty exciting.

Bringing the City Archives, the City Museum, the Police Museum and the Canadian Lacrosse Hall of Fame together under one roof will also bee a boon. With the Fraser River Discovery Centre just across the tracks, we will have a one-stop-shopping “museum core”, with a gift shop and food options attached. Finally, when friends and relatives are visiting for a day, we can give them a spot to go to entertain themselves for several hours, without having to send them to Vancouver.

The transportation planning around the facility has not been finalized, but I can already see a few concerns. The re-vamping of 8th Street between Carnarvon and Columbia will have to be approached with caution. Presumably, there will be no bus stops on 8th once the loop at Plaza 88 is completed, but the previous crossing issue at 8th at the SkyTrain exit will remain. People will still want to cross mid-block from the station to the new MUCF. It is too bad an elevated walkway from the Skytrain to the east side of 8th is not included in the plans.

Worse, when one leaves the Skytrain Station and the Plaza 88 commercial/entertainment centre, you will be greeted with a view of the garage ramp on 8th. Why stick a garage entrance right in the middle of your façade? We want this area to be as pedestrian-friendly as possible, and a garage entrance crossing the sidewalk does not do this. This area needs a re-think, and I suspect the answer will be to stick the cars (and garage entrance) around back on Begbie.

The plans show the use of Begbie as the Greenway connector between Columbia and Carnarvon, which is a sub-optimal solution. The slope on 8th between Carnarvon and Columbia is less then 8%, which is a much more bike-friendly grade than the slope on Begbie (higher than 10%). The Central Valley Greenway should connect to Hyack Square and the New Westminster Skytrain directly, along Columbia to 8th. For these reasons, 8th should remain the connection between Columbia and Carnarvon for bikes, with cars accessing the underground parking along the much-less-trafficked Begbie side.

The idea of closing Alexander Street and using it only for loading is great, but let’s be sensitive to what it means to the people in the low-costs housing around there, who will now be shadowed by a new tower, will be facing a loading dock for their front yard, and will have reduced access to Columbia Street. Some creative urban design might be needed here to head off a potential crime problem.

Again, this is early design phase, so these potential issues can be addressed simply, but they have to start thinking about them soon before too much detailed design is completed.

Which brings me back to design. The preliminary drawings are definitely “place making”. They have that big “I’m Here” look to them. However, much of the chatter around the room was about “where is the heritage?” Simply put, this building needs to fit the surroundings. I love the Chicago-school Westminster Building and Trapp Block. I am not a big fan of the “modern-glass-tower humping a heritage façade” technique used at the InterUrban, but recognized that the requirements of the modern Condo market (balconies, floor-to-ceiling windows, etc) made this the best we could hope for. I will be interested to see how the Art-Deco Façade at Plaza 88 is preserved, and how it fits those hideous-looking pseudo-Soviet towers. Mostly, I love Art Deco (cognizant that it can go really bad really quickly), and would love to see that part of New Westminster’s heritage be accentuated, but that is very much a personal matter of taste.

Since there is going to be an office tower on top of this building, there is a lot more flexibility in design than there would be for a condo complex. As this is going to be the keystone building for the continued revitalisation of Columbia Street, it is imperative that the visual impact of this building represent New Westminster, both its iconic heritage, and where we want the City to be. It should be an interesting challenge for a talented Architect. The pictures I have seen so far, and the comments I heard around the room, suggest they are not there yet.

Oh, and I seriously hope “MUCF” is a working title, and we will find a better name for the building, but that is a minor detail, which we can debate in 2014.