Tag: Acting Locally

on the Shark Fin Soup Bylaw

Posted on . by Patrick Johnstone. Leave a comment.

This Monday New Westminster City Council is going to attack one of the great environmental issues of the day: the unsustainable harvesting of sharks for their fins.

These fins, when boiled long enough to get the urea stink out, dried, powdered, and added to soup, provide a certain gelatinous texture that apparently proves your wealth and success in some cultures. Their harvest from depleted shark populations is one of those long-standing environmental concerns that has only come to popular knowledge due to recent video-recorded cruelty to charismatic megafauna, and it is a certain cause celebre these days. I really have no problem with that.

One only has to look at the long list of animals endangered or made extinct because someone claimed eating bits of them will give you an erection to see just how asinine humans are in the collective, and how easy it is for a protected cultural belief to result in the decimation of an ecosystem. Sharks are important animals in the ocean, and just as banning the global ivory trade is an important step in protecting the elephants, banning shark fin may play a role in protecting endangered sharks. So ending the popularity of shark fin soup is probably a good thing.

In fact, a professional organization I work with, the Environmental Managers Association of BC awarded a grant a few months ago to a grass-roots organization called SharkTruth, who work to raise awareness at the consumer level about shark fin soup and the associated unsustainable harvesting of sharks. I fully supported this choice for a grant recipient, because I agree with their cause and the approach that group takes (if you care about this issue, please think about helping them out!).

So why am I against a Shark Fin Bylaw?

Ultimately, it is the Federal Government who (through a document called the Constitution Act of 1982) has the mandate and the responsibility to protect the oceans around Canada and the fishes within. It is also the sole level of government empowered to negotiate and sign international agreements like the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna. It is also empowered to prevent the import and sale of things like ivory, rhino horn, tiger gall bladders, or whatever is getting sick old men up these days.

This is not a job that municipalities should, or even can, do. Do we imagine Bylaw officers inspecting the backs of restaurants for signs of shark fin? De we expect that offending soup is confiscated by a Bylaw officer, taken to a lab for analysis to determine if it indeed contained shark fin and not the much cheaper alternative (gelatin, which is kind of gross when you know what it is, but at least it is a by-product of meat possessing and can be sourced sustainably), then spend 6 months putting the case together to take the Restaurant Owner to court to recover a $1000 fine? Is this how you want your property tax dollars spent?

Of course it will never happen. The Restaurants will take Shark Fin off their menu (talk on the street is that the Starlight Casino hosts the only restaurant in town that sells shark fin soup) and, if they are unscrupulous, will continue to sell it in a hush-hush kind of way for special events only, and no money will be spent on enforcement at all.

So what purpose the Bylaw? To “shame” the restaurants into hiding their shark fins? To show support for a noble cause? I hate to be the guy who says this: but doesn’t the City have bigger environmental responsibility fights to put their energy into – ones they actually have the jurisdiction to do something about?

It has taken only a couple of months for this idea to come to the City, and for a Bylaw to see third reading. Meanwhile, it has been 18 months – a year and a half- since I went to Council to remind them that we are one of the few municipalities in the Lower Mainland that does not have a Tree Protection Bylaw. In June of 2011, Council resolved the following:

“WHEREAS trees are essential to air quality, esthetics and quality of life;
BE IT RESOLVED THAT New Westminster develop a Tree Retention / Removal Bylaw for both public and private property.”

…and we have not had a single update on progress towards that Bylaw in a year anda half.

Protecting the trees in our neighbourhoods is something our City Council has the power and the jurisdiction to do. Saving sharks in the East China Sea is both outside of their jurisdiction and beyond their powers. So, why is there a rush to do the second and no interest in doing the first?

Yes, the worldwide decimation of shark populations and the trade in shark fins is a legitimate concern. The City can (without a Bylaw) express their support for the banning of shark fin imports- it can even choose to publicly shame businesses that choose to serve it, or refuse them a business licence (as they threatened to do recently with a legal medical marijuana dispensary). But to what end?
For the Feds to deal with this issue domestically, it would only require an update of the Species List under the CITES Act to include those species of sharks that are used for fin trade: it wouldn’t even require a new piece of legislation. No debate, no committee work, just a feat of Ministerial signature would get it done. The necessary inspection and enforcement procedures are already in place, and it would allow Canada to be one of the leaders internationally in the protection of sharks in the world’s oceans (wouldn’t it be nice to once again be the leader in something positive?).

My MP has already been outspoken on this issue, the Minister of Fisheries isn’t really interested in dealing with the issue, nor is the Federal Minister of (cough) Environment. This, however, is the only place where useful action on this issue can happen. Supporting Fin Donnelly to get action at the Federal Level and, in turn, the International Level is the appropriate way to address this issue under the Constitution of Canada.

Then City Council and Staff can stop wasting their time, and get on with that 18-month old resolution to start protecting trees in the City.

Thrifty Pedestrians

Posted on . by Patrick Johnstone. 4 Comments.

I think I love Thrifty Foods.

All of the sudden there are a lot of grocery options in New Westminster. No less than three Safeways, all of them of the recent-design mega-big variety; a Save-On-Foods of the slightly-too-compact urban style, an IGA that is seemingly a little crowded out and increasingly out of the way, along with Donald’s at the River Market and other smaller boutique-type options. Notably, Thrifty’s is the only Grocery spot in Sapperton (7-11 excepted, of course). The only grocery deadzone appears to be Queensborough (although, someone might tell me they have groceries in Wal-Mart: I’ll never know).

I have nothing against Safeway, and think their willingness to put a storefront on a Transit mall is a bold move worthy of praise, but I generally find their prices a little high, and their approach a little too “corporate”. I am “personally” thanked by checkers, with few of them taking to time to look at my actual name before saying, blankly, “Thank You Mr. Moose” (A Safeway Card under the name Space Moose was a bit of culture-jamming I engaged in a few years back. Note, if William Jefferson Clinton wins a big prize in one of those Save-on-More Card contests, I’m not sure how hard it will be to collect. But it makes my junk mail more interesting).

Alas, we tend to buy our groceries within walking distance, which means the Save-on-Foods with its less-than-optimal aisle widths, it’s strange practice of labelling all of its fruit as multi-origin (“Apples: USA/Canada”), and its distinct paucity of humans working the checkouts.

Aside: Look, the automatic checkout is never faster or more convenient for the shopper than having a person check your food, unless there are not enough checkout staff. If you think I can enter the code for apples (fuji or ambrosia? ) or lettuce (green leaf or romaine?), operate a bar-code scanner, and fill a grocery bag faster or more efficiently than someone who does it 8 hours a day, you are crazy. Essentially, Jimmy Pattison is getting me to do the work of his staff – because he doesn’t have to pay me. . –end rant

I would be remiss to also point out that Ms.NWimby does most of the grocery shopping for the household. This is mostly because of her advanced ability to shop ahead a week (instead of my tendency to buy for today and tomorrow), but also because she found me no fun to shop with, as I am generally an ornery retail customer (having grown up working in retail and having high customer-service expectations) and not much fun to be around when assaulted by bad retail decisions.

For smaller “just-pick-up-a-few-things” trips, I tend to run up to the Uptown Market on 6th – a small shop that always impresses me with their variety, quality, and customer service. In the summer, the drive to buy local often leads us to Hop-On Farms on Marine Drive- for garden-fresh produce. Weekly trips to the Royal City Farmers Market just about rounds out or grocery experience.

So I have only been in Thrifty’s a few times, but I might need to start about making it the usual – maybe I’ll buy a cargo bike, and take some of the load off of Ms.NWimby. The thing about Thrifty’s is that it is everything I like: they have a good mix of basic groceries and higher-end fancy stuff. They have a nice produce section, and I know what is being grown domestically. The space itself is expansive and comfortable, the lighting is soft and organic. I’m not assaulted by offers to save more by buying more than I need. And when I am done shopping, an actual human being helps ring up my purchase. In fact, there are actual human beings working throughout the store – unobtrusive but helpful. I just wish it was walking distance.

I hope (and expect) that Thrifty’s will prosper in Sapperton, even though it is currently neigh-impossible for many Sapperton folks to walk there. And here is where my second rant of the blog post begins:

The City of New Westminster has, as I have noted many times before, a Pedestrian Charter. The Charter says that the City puts a high value on pedestrian safety and access, and that walking will be prioritized over other forms of transportation within the community.

Meanwhile, for the entire time Thrifty’s has been open, the sidewalk leading north from Thrifty’s up Columbia Street has been closed to pedestrians, with no accommodation made for safe passage of those on foot. People walking down Columbia from Royal Columbian Hospital or any other business in Sapperton (not to mention about 70% of the residences in Sapperton), need to cross Columbia for a block, then cross back at Simpson Street to get to Thrifty’s.

This might be a minor nuisance, except there is no safe crosswalk at Simpson Street! Right where Thrifty’s entrance/exit abuts the “closed” sidewalk, there is nary a street sign, paint on the ground, pedestrian sign, flashing light on anything to facilitate the safe crossing of the street. I stood there on a recent Sunday afternoon, and watched as people (young, old, single, groups, adults and children) walked out of the store, and made the choice between weaving through the “no pedestrian zone” barriers and tape (there was no active construction happening) or braving an unmarked crossing of a busy street while laden with groceries. Never did I see a car stop to let people cross. Even with light Sunday traffic, it was a terrible situation.

Problem is, it has been like this for months – has no-one in the City recognized this problem? I know I brought it to the attention to someone on staff two months ago, but nothing seems to have been done. Of course, I shouldn’t have to bring it to the attention of staff: when the sidewalk closure was approved to facilitate ongoing construction on the Brewery District site, was no though paid to how people were going to get past the site, to the one significant pedestrian destination south of the site? That is what a community with a Pedestrian Charter should look like. A crosswalk would take $100 worth of paint, the contractor building the new building should have to pay for it.

Or, for an example of what should have been done, walk up to Uptown Property Group’s development on 6th Ave and 5th Street and look at the hoarding arrangement there. There are concrete blocks and scaffolding cover to protect pedestrians from construction and from passing cars during construction. The point is, pedestrians are accommodated as important road users, and are not forced to cross the road unsafely (although, I note, there are marked crosswalks at every intersection near there to improve safety there as well). What’s good for Uptown should be good for Sapperton.

I just wish there was a Thrifty’s Uptown.

NextUP and Risk

Posted on . by Patrick Johnstone. 5 Comments.

This weekend, when not on the curling ice or licking my wounds in the lounge after, I was kicking up my heels at the NextUP event: Dancing Dweeb; Old and Tweed; Almost Seventy.

It was a fun evening, recognizing the emerging leaders of the “new” New Westminster, as selected by the Newsleader. My  impression from the organizers is that the City does a very good job recognizing its tradition and history, and its long-serving community members, but we rarely acknowledge the up-and-coming generation of potential leaders. As a Citizen-of-the-Year nominee said to me last week (and I paraphrase): “It is nice someone is recognizing those with positive viewpoints and optimism, instead of always hearing from the City’s boo-birds!”

The result is an interesting collection of New Westminster residents: from an internationally-recognized author to a Sportscaster who takes time from reporting on the Olympics to coach the local High School football team, to some of the City’s biggest cheerleaders. There are volunteers, business owners, innovative thinkers, and other community-builders.

And one random blogovator.

The guest speaker was the most inspiring part of the event for me. Mark Brand of the Save-on-Meats social empire. If you don’t know his story, here is a story about his unique approach to community-based business. Or watch this bank commercial to see another look at his story:

I loved Mark’s talk, because he gave us just enough of his stunningly diverse upbringing to let us see into his motivations in building community, and because it always felt he was talking from the heart (I also admired that he wasn’t afraid to drop a well-applied f-bomb in front of the Acting Mayor!). However, Mark’s talk mostly got me thinking about risk, how different people measure the reward part of the risk-reward equation, and how we measure success.

The NextUP group included people like me, who do our thing (if you consider whinging on-line a “thing”), and people like Tej Kainth who do lots of things all the time, all for the building of community. But I have comfortable job and a comfortable life: not rich, but not worried about money, because I can afford to eat and I don’t spend much. I have the luxury of volunteer time and energy and ability (and recognize those are luxuries many cannot afford). But I don’t really take risks in my life. I rarely have. So coming out of the NextUP event, I wanted to acknowledge those people in our City who have taken and are taking risks.

I think about NextUP honouree Paul Minhas – who took a risk on Columbia Street almost a decade ago, when few others were forecasting the resurgence of the Golden Mile. He decided he could run a place that had good food, a friendly atmosphere, an artistic setting, and (here is the magic) live music every night! More than a jazz club, the Heritage Grill hosts open mic nights, poetry, LGBT events, bluegrass, rock-a-billy, flamenco, mariachi – you just don’t know what you might hear one night at the Heritage. But it is always live, and it is close-up and intimate, so you can have a beer with the artist between sets. I have met much of my New West Social Network indirectly through Paul, as his club was willing to host Green Drinks – an event where he surely sold more connections and conversations than actual drinks (aside:  look for a return of Green Drinks New West edition in 2013). The point is, Paul was right, and his risk has paid off for the neighbourhood where there are now a half-dozen nice spots to get a beer (but still only one dedicated live-music venue!)

Or NextUP honouree Mark Shieh, who saw the empty husk of the Westminster Quay – almost derelict after 20 years of failure to find momentum – and took a risk. He risked his energy, his credit, his money. A Mechanical Engineer opening and running some sort of new-style urban shopping mall: Crazy. Mark is still taking that risk, as tenants are arriving, some prospering, some likely just waiting and hoping that their own risk will pay off. But look at the River Market on any given Saturday, and you can see that there is something being built here from which we are all benefiting.

I had friends visiting from Calgary/Toronto last weekend, and was proud to take them down to the Market for brunch, and show them the optimism of the Market, the beauty of the location, and the quality of the food! I didn’t feel like I had to take out-of-town guests down to Vancouver to “show off” my community. Between the River Market, the Pier Park, and Antique Alley, we had a great afternoon in New West.

What the two Marks and Paul have in common is that they took the risk, for which many more if us are receiving the reward. I think especially of Mark Brand, who seems to have taken a series of huge leaps, run several businesses, and seemingly never made much money. A guy with that kind of entrepreneurial spirit and relentless drive could be driving a Ferrari and choosing what shade of white shag would best suit his yacht. Instead, he is building a social enterprise – building a community. For his own benefit surely (we build the world we want to live in), but also for the benefit of untold future entrepreneurs using his “incubator” kitchen, and for the neighbours who for whatever reason haven’t had the opportunity to find success in our society.

I admire these risk-takers, from someone not nearly as brave. But you got me thinking: maybe its time for me to take a risk or two. There are a few things I would like to see happen in this City that will take a more hands-on approach. Maybe it’s time for me to take a chance.

In which I once was wrong.

Posted on . by Patrick Johnstone. Leave a comment.

Nothing worse that being criticized by someone who is right…

I just received a comment from someone on a post I wrote a few months ago, and it deserves more attention than being buried as a comment in a months-old post (I also like his style: mixing compliment with insult so subtley, that I somehow feel better about being called an idiot). So read the post here, and here is the comment from “D Calen Knauf” in its entirety:

Interesting view you have, not as negative as I had hoped. Naive and selfish negativity towards skateboarding is much more fun to debase. I have several issues with this article and with your proposals to improve the state of skateboarding at pier park. Right off the bat you propose more skateparks. That is like saying “god I hate it when runners wizz by me when I’m walking in the morning, clearly there aren’t enough running tracks and ovals. Let’s build some more!” that is not solving anyone’s problem. The reason people are skateboarding places other than skateparks is because that is what skateboarding is all about. Maybe you grew up in a community of people that really appreciate structure, rules and segregation. There are many other groups of people that don’t find that type of activity engaging or fun and prefer an activity with creative freedom and a sense of personal challenge. Skateboarding started in the street and will always be there, just like walking, running, biking…

As far as damages go, the damage you see now is as far as the damage will go. It’s concrete, not stucco, it gets a little dirty, the edge rounds off and that’s about it. Roads get tire marks on them sidewalks get scuffed and chipped from use, why do you all of a sudden feel that these edges are any different. It’s a patina on the city, like the green oxidization on the Vancouver hotel roof. You mention that the park was so nice with kids laughing and people playing guitar… well personally I don’t have kids and don’t appreciate the sound of their laughter the same way you do. Same goes for the guitar, or basketball, or… the difference between me and you is that I–like you mention– realize that I am living in a society, and realize that what I like doesn’t always align with what other people like, and I realize this and put up with their annoying kids yelling and laughing, their bad guitar playing, and their loud basketballs, and hope that they will give me the same curtsey.

I pay taxes just like you, probably more, and would like to see an end to kids laughing and basket ball and guitar playing at pier park… just kidding, but that’s how ignorant you sound.

Funny, after I wrote that blog post, and parts of it got picked up in the local paper, I had several people who I know and respect ask me why I was so against skateboards? That was not my intention. At first I blamed this on the Newspaper only mentioning my negative comments, and not mentioning the “positive part” where I suggested constructive solutions. It took some friends to point out to me that I really was sounding more like Abe Simpson than I thought. Sucks to get old, and sudden self-awareness definitely doesn’t help.

First, the criticism I got from some friends. One pointed out that I was complaining about youth doing something collective, creative, athletic, and constructive, and I seemed to only see the negative impacts of it (noise, scuff marks, concrete wear). He was absolutely right.

A second friend pointed out that more skateparks or structured facilities were not going to solve my alleged problems here, because I didn’t understand what the skaters were doing. They weren’t looking for a place designed for skating, they were looking to apply their skills in places not specifically designed for that purpose. This is where a lot of the creativity and skills growth related to skating comes from. As a non-skater, I maybe didn’t recognize this (but as someone who dabbled in BMX and mountain bike trials riding, I probably should have – again, blame my advancing age). It sounds like that is what you are getting at with the “running track” allegory.

So, mea culpa: you are right. I kind of missed the point with that one. We live in a society, and we all need to recognize when we don’t understand a situation. Maybe I should have just sat down with those guys at the park and had a conversation. Maybe the commenter above was one of them, and could have provided me a better understanding of the situation from his viewpoint.

Thanks for commenting.

The Coffee Crossing and bigger problems

Posted on . by Patrick Johnstone. Leave a comment.

New Westminster is a pretty pedestrian-friendly city, despite the hills. Our high urban density means services are always nearby, we have exceptional access to rapid transit, and our infrastructure is pretty good. Our City-wide “Walkability Index” is among the best in the Lower Mainland and Canada, and the City’s transportation plan emphasizes the importance of walking as a form of transportation, through the City’s ACTBiPed, and a Pedestrian Charter.

This is not to say everything is perfect. We still have too many pedestrians hit by cars, too few marked crossings, and accessibility challenges in some areas (including a general paucity of sidewalks in Queensborough). Overall, the City is doing a pretty good job, and the Staff and Council generally understand the issue, but there is always room for improvement.

Last week we had two news stories that demonstrate both the good and the bad.

There is talk that plans to “improve” the Coffee Crossing in uptown are on hold, and in this case, not fixing a problem that isn’t actually a problem is a good thing.

That pedestrian crossing is, actually, a very effective one for pedestrians, as Bart Slotman suggests in the article above. It is short, the cars are travelling slowly and they tend to yield to pedestrians more than most crossings. If there was any improvement needed, it might be as simple as getting rid of one or two parking spots (like where the gold Chevy truck is in the story above), to increase visibility for both driver and pedestrian. However, there is no need to spend tens or hundreds of thousands of dollars to install signals to “fix” a pedestrian crossing that basically works and is not demonstrably unsafe.

If there is any perceived problem with this crossing, it is that it emphasizes pedestrians over drivers. It is occasionally inconvenient for the minority of users because drivers may, on some occasion, need to wait for 10 or 15 seconds for a line of pedestrians to cross. In extreme events, this may stretch to 30 seconds (the horror). This “problem” is built on the assumption that roads are for cars, with pedestrians a temporary inconvenience. The alternative point of view (supported by the Pedestrian Charter) is that roads are for moving people, and people moving using their feet have as much right to the road space as people carrying 1500kg of metal and plastic along with them.

This intersection is in one of the busiest pedestrian-use places in the City – the businesses and residents of Uptown rely on a safe pedestrian environment to go about their daily lives. If the busiest pedestrian location in the City is inconvenient for drivers, they can move a block over. This crosswalk is an important part of that safe pedestrian environment. If it delays the occasional through-driver by a few seconds, then so be it.

The second story provides a great suggestion for what to do with the money saved by not installing lights at the Coffee Crossing. The residents of Massey Heights have been concerned for years about the safety of 8th Avenue through their neighbourhood, both for drivers and pedestrians.

The problems on the Heights part of 8th Ave are pretty standard, from a traffic-management view. The road is a major arterial carrying a lot of traffic through residential neighbourhoods. With the slope, the sightlines are often challenging, and it is easy to underestimate your stopping distances as the hills gradually steepen. An engineering response to this is to make the road very wide to improve sightlines, but this invariably encourages drivers to go faster, especially as there are no speed controls between Cumberland and East Columbia – it is a 1.5km long, 12m-wide speedway that bypasses narrower, more speed-controlled alternatives (6th Ave, 10th Ave, etc.). This rather sucks if you live in the neighbourhood or try to walk across 8th Ave.

The old-school solution to the pedestrian problem was to build a narrow, dank pedestrian tunnel under 8th around Richmond Street, to keep pedestrians from causing traffic to slow down. As unappealing as the tunnel is for most people, for most of that stretch of 8th, crossing the road has been a daunting enterprise. It is almost impossible at rush hour, as a line of a couple of dozen cars approach from the west, then as they come to an end, a line of several dozen cars arrive from the east. Better road marking and signs will not cause that line of cars to break just because someone is at the crosswalk – they are all trying to make the next light. This is the place for pedestrian-activated flashers.

The ACTBiPed and the Victory-Massey Heights residents have been complaining about this for years. It looks now like the City is going to put some resources towards fixing the problem, and they are looking for your input.

My suggestions? First, forget the tunnel at Richmond Street, and do the job as recommended:.

This should be a fully-signalized intersection, one with full crosswalks painted on both sides. Richmond Street is a major north-south connection, close enough to the Crosstown Greenway that it is a major pedestrian and bike route to the Hume Park area and to Burnaby. Given the nature of the intersection and traffic, and slope of the hill there, full stop lights are overdue.

As for Sherbrooke Street, I frankly don’t care if they close off Sherbrooke and Devoy (best ask the local drivers), and the sidewalk bumps help pedestrians (although they make things slightly less comfortable for cyclists). However, this is the place where a pedestrian-controlled flasher is needed. Traffic regularly hits 80km/h along here (despite the 50km/h limit), with long lines of cars between light signals at the distant intersections.

The same is the case for where Williams and McKay intersect 8th Ave, 300m to the west. This is another major pedestrian cross-street, where it is neigh impossible to cross safely as a pedestrian during rush hour. I suggest we need a second pedestrian-controlled crossing here. There is mention of “improvements” at that intersection, but no details provided. Clearly, all of the safety issues that exist at Sherbrooke also apply at Williams, and similar treatments are appropriate.

There is an on-line survey at the City’s website on the topic of 8th Ave improvements. You might want to fill it out right away, as it closes this Thursday. Please take 5 minutes and ask them to assure that pedestrian safety be the #1 priority in this residential neighbourhood. Accommodating through-traffic is important, but a distant second to the safety and livability of our neighbourhoods. We need a fully-singnalized intersection at Richmond, and pedestrian-activated flashers at both Sherbrooke and Williams.

My 12 minutes of EnVisioning

Posted on . by Patrick Johnstone. Leave a comment.

The City of New Westminster kicked off their Integrated Community Sustainability Plan process – called EnVision2032 – this weekend with a two-day Sustainability event.

Saturday, there were more than 100 people in a room discussing a variety of topics, and workshopping ideas about what a more sustainable New Westminster will look like in 20 years – the planning horizon for EnVision2032. There were lively and interesting discussions, and a broad set of ideas and principles were discussed. This is only the start of a long planning process, but I think the attendees gave City Staff a good foundation upon which they can build the plan.

This followed the Friday night “inspiration” event, when the planning process was outlined, and some motivation was provided through a half-dozen speakers and a couple of video shorts. I was honoured to be one of the speakers, providing a 10-minute case for environmental sustainability and community engagement. There were accomplished community leaders on the agenda, so I kept my remarks short and light to get out of their way – the comedy relief of the evening if you will. Since I talked fast and pared it down to fit in 12 minutes of my allotted 10, I figured I would expand a bit on the speech here, with the images I used.

The following is a slightly extended version of my 10 (+2) minutes on the stage – with parts I edited out on the spot to make my allotted time.

So I care about Environmental Sustainability, for somewhat selfish reasons. I kind of like the environment the way it is. Being someone who studied ancient climates on the geologic scale in my academic life, I recognize that the biosphere has changed remarkably over the 4 billion years of life on Earth. But the environment of the last 100,000 years, the environment where humans prospered and developed things like “society” and “the economy” has been remarkable stable. Until now.

There is no reason to believe the rapid changes we are seeing now in the biosphere, from the atmosphere to the ocean to the forests, will benefit the prosperity of humans. So why are we changing it?

When an environmentalist like me comes to a mixed crowd and says we need to drive less, burn less oil and coal, use less electricity, rely more on local and seasonal food, account for the pollution we cause, etc., it is usually seen as anti-progress. The recommended “heckler” response is:

“You Suzuki types won’t be happy until we are all living in caves using candles and eating cockroaches!”

I hope to demonstrate the exact opposite is true. And to do that, I want to invoke this guy:

Who worked as an economic adviser to this dirty hippie:

…and had a son who turned in to this guy:

But back when Herbert Stein was working for that Maoist hippie commune called the American Enterprise Institute, he coined an economic truism that was so new, so profound, and so important, it became known a Steins Law:

“If something cannot go on forever, it will stop,”

When coined, Stein was talking about balance of payment deficits – and he was arguing for laissez-faire free market capitalism. In a free market, deficits cannot go on forever, so we don’t need to take action to stop them, they will stop of their own accord. (note at the time, the cumulative US debt was about $300 Billion, it is now approaching $13 Trillion).The same could of course be said of ballooning housing prices and irresponsible mortgage practices in the US in the mid 2000s. They were unsustainable, so in 2008 they stopped.

In that sense, Steins Law might be the greatest statement ever made about “Sustainability” since Bruntlund went to the UN. Stein would have said we don’t need to worry about burning the last of our oil, we don’t need to worry about removing fish from the sea faster than they can reproduce, we don’t need to worry about putting more CO2 in the atmosphere than planetary biosystems can remove… all of these things will stop eventually. The question is whether we, as a society and as an economy, decide when that stop happens, or if we just sit around and face the cold shock of it happening.

Now, a common response to this is that Malthus was wrong. Technology will come the rescue, it always has. If we run out of oil we will use natural gas; if we run out of natural gas, we will use nuclear; if we run out of uranium, we will develop fusion – the technifix is there.

The simplest answer to this approach is that it ignores that existence of fixed limits to the environment, regardless of technology. I am going to use energy use for the example, partly because I believe energy use is the #1 environmental issue on the planet today, the one all of our other issues, economic, social, or environmental, stem from, and partly because someone else already did the math for me.

Energy use over the last 400 years, on a global scale, has increased exponentially at a pretty constant rate. Through the transitions from wood and animal power to coal and steam then electricity, kerosene, refined petroleum, and nuclear energy – this gate of growth has been pretty constant. Plotted on a logarithmic scale, it is a flat line showing constant growth.

For the fun of it (and partly to demonstrate the fallacy of projecting too far into the future), Dr. Murphy projected this rate of energy use growth into the future, with hilarious results:

Note that only 400 years from now, we will need to tap 100% of the energy the planet receives from the sun. That would require 100% efficient solar panels on every square inch of the earth’s surface. A thousand years from then we will need to tap the entire energy supply of the sun. On the scale of “societies” and “economies”, 400 years is not that long a time… there are buildings built by Europeans here on the North American continent that are almost 400 years old…

Ok, the technofix to the rescue again, Why rely on the sun? In 400 years, we will use Cold Fusion or Zero Point Energy or tap the limitless energy of fairy wings. However, there are other limits. Whenever you use energy, you create heat. There is no getting around the Second law of Thermodynamics. Whenever we use energy to do something, lift a book, drive a car, smelt some steel, we create heat. The cumulative heat of this energy use is “sunk” to the biosphere. At this point, we slightly increase the heat of the planet through fossil fuel and nuclear power- much less than a degree (separate than “Global Warming” and other feedback effects, this is literally converting other types of energy to heat that must be dissipated). If we continue to grow energy use at current rates, the average temperature of the planet’s surface will double in less than 400 years. And in about 450 years, the average surface temperature on Earth will be at the boiling point of water.

Don’t worry, this can’t actually happen, as every multi-cellular form of life on the planet will be long dead – the temperature cannot continue to increase, it will stop. Just like Ben Stein’s dad told Nixon.

So, again, the question we need to ask ourselves- will we take the laissez-faire approach and leave the next generations to deal with the problem, or will we acknowledge this issue, take personal responsibility for this, and take it on now? I argue the second.

OK, if we agree that we need to do something, what to do? How do we get there? How do we get there? How do we engage and change the narrative applied to us?

Of course, you can just change things in your life. You can buy a Prius, or even stop driving altogether. You can grow your own food in your back yard, you can build a rammed-earth house with ground-source geothermal, passive solar and photovoltaics and a composting toilet and live off the grid. But that won’t change the world, because the guy living next door to you just bought an F-450 Super Duty with a 7-litre diesel for hauling his boat out the lake every weekend so he can “rip-it up”.

This isn’t going to work. To change the world, we need leaders to make the hard choices. As engaged, concerned citizens, it is up to us to empower our elected officials to make those hard decisions. Beyond choosing how we vote, we can arm them with information, we can voice our support, and we can ask them tough questions that force then to think differently.

That is what the NWEP does – and why I want to talk about the NWEP model as an example of positive engagement towards sustainability. We engage citizens and decision makers on issues around sustainability.

We reach out, as a collective, to the City and the community to move ideas forward. We run events that raise public awareness. We delegate to City Council and take part in City committees, to assure Sustainability is always a part of the conversation within the City. We reach out to City staff and share ideas, try to understand their challenges and provide solutions. We delegate to council and have less-formal discussions with elected officials, to again increase understanding on both sides, and to hopefully clear-up misconceptions about what “Sustainability” means, and about the value of a healthy environment.

We don’t protest. OK, we usually don’t protest.

Protesting can be a divisive activity- it calls into question decisions that are being made in the most aggressive way, and can put people who made decisions on the defensive. We would rather, collectively, take part in a constructive conversation and use personal conversations, the power of ideas and constructive criticism, and humour, to bring peoples’ thinking to a place where hard decisions become obvious decisions.

How do we apply this in an urban setting? What are our Sustainability goals in a developed City? The same as in other settings: reducing our externalities. Less energy in, less waste out, and creating efficiency in our internal systems.

Energy has obvious implications in New West. This City is uniquely empowered (pun) to take control of its electrical energy consumption, as we own our own electrical utility.

So where is our co-generation program? Where are our roof-top photovoltaics across our expansive south-facing slopes? Where are our small turbines? Where is our sewer heat recovery, or groundsource geothermal, our riversource geothermal?

Here is a picture of Nelson, in the West Kootenay, similar to New West in that it is full of old, inefficient, but historic buildings and it operates its own energy utility. Nelson has introduced a municipal ecosave program, where you can pay the capital cost for efficiency upgrades to your house through the savings in your power bill. This is on top of the rapidly-disappearing Federal and Provincial programs – an example of a City moving forward.
Note also the Solar Colwood program introduced by one of the earlier speakers tonight)

Waste is another area where municipalities can make tough choices. I could go on at length about the successes of the City’s solid waste diversion plans, compost-promotion and green organic waste collection system. Good news all around.

…but I could also go on at length about how burning trash for energy is inherently as unsustainable as burning coal. Its cheaper, it is easier, and it carries a certain “green” patina: it may be socially acceptable and economically prudent at this time, but it ain’t sustainable. We need to think better – and may soon need to make a tough choice here.

What about those internal systems? Places where the Urban Environment can put back, improve the world’s overall sustainability?

One example is protecting and promoting the Urban Forest- trees in the City provide remarkable benefits from reduced heating and cooling energy use to improved storm water retention, air quality improvements, habitat protection for birds and other animals. Protecting and promoting trees is an easy choice.

Living in denser, more diverse communities mean we spend less time and energy travelling between home, work, and play. This is why your average New Westminster resident drives less than your average Kelowna resident, or even your average Langley resident – this is a tangible benefit well-planned dense urban environments can provide- a “value added” to the environment.

There are harder questions I could raise. Try this: go up to any Federal or Provincial candidate and ask them when their party is going to offer a Zero-growth economic model as part of their platform. It’s inevitable that economic growth will stop. It has to, just ask Ben Stein’s father. The question is how it stops.

Can we empower our elected officials enough that they can admit this during an election cycle?

Are we going to plan a sustainable future now, when resources are still relatively plentiful and we can still have the most comfortable sustainable future possible? Or will we wait until resources are so decimated, that we are scrapping for what we can get? I don’t want to live in a cave cooking roaches over a candle- which is why we need to start now- actually we needed to start yesterday, making the choices that will protect our resources, protect our society and our economy- protect the environment that has allowed us to build this comfortable lifestyle.

Livable cities are part of the solution – and we are just getting started!

EnVision2032 this weekend!

Posted on . by Patrick Johnstone. 1 Comment.

The NWEP AGM went very well. There were four departing board members, we refreshed with three new board members and a fourth person is returning to the board after a one-year hiatus. It is good to have a combination of old and new ideas, and I look forward to working with the new team (which should give you the hint about who the returning-after-a-hiatus person is).

Speaking at the AGM were Mark Allison, who is a Senior Planner for the City of New Westminster, and Ann Rowan, a Senior Policy Analyst for our regional government, MetroVancouver. They spoke of community engagement and how individuals and organizations can make a difference in their community.

There were two big ideas I took away from the discussions.

First (to paraphrase Mark), when it comes to community planning and municipal government the decisions are generally made by “those that show up”. At open houses, at council delegations, at community meetings and advisory councils. Those that take an active part in the discussion are the only ones whose voices will be heard in the discussions.

Second (to paraphrase Ann), there are easy things individuals can do to improve the situation in the world from a sustainability standpoint: drive less, live in a more efficient house, conserve energy, buy local food, and generally buy less. However, talking to politicians is also one of those things, and it is one that it is often easier for groups to do than individuals. Bringing ideas to, sharing knowledge with, and providing support for the elected types is an important way to empower them to make the right decisions.

I’m glad to say: these are two things the NWEP does well locally.

This is what I hope to talk about (if I ever get a speech written….) at the City of New Westminster’s Envision2032 event this Friday. Besides taking part in the Saturday workshop (see “showing up” above), I am taking part in the Friday night social – an inspirational event where people who work or advocate in Sustainability Planning will talk the talk, hoping to inspire the Saturday participants to walk the walk on Saturday.

Yep, another “City Consultation” process for yet, another “Plan”. But I hope to emphasise that the Integrated Community Sustainability Plan is the big one. This is the over-arching set of community standards and goals that will inform subsequent Official Community Plans, Master Transportation Plans, Local Area Plans, Affordable Housing Plans, etc. etc. Once approved in 2013, the ICSP will provide guidance for the next generation of community development. How will we grow? How will we manage the volatility in world energy markets? How will we care for the homeless and the economically disenfranchised? How will we prioritize our taxation and spending? This Plan will set the stage upon which our City’s resurgence will play out. Take it from the City’s Sustainability Planner– this is a rather big deal.

If you live in New West, own property in New West, run a business or work in New West, you might want to drop by on Saturday and spend a couple of hours helping to sketch out that plan. This is your opportunity to show up, and your opportunity to speak to politicians: in other words, your opportunity to make the change you want to see happen.

You need to register before Thursday, mostly because they need to know how much lunch to order. Yes, if you spend a couple of hours on rainy Saturday when there is no Hockey on TV helping out the City – your City– you will get a free lunch!

Also, show up Friday night for the inspiration event, and find out if I ever got a speech written. I’m thinking of talking about this guy’s contribution to Sustainability thinking:

 

Building Community – THE NWEP AGM

Posted on . by Patrick Johnstone. Leave a comment.

Monday night is the Annual General Meeting of the New Westminster Environmental Partners, an organization which, when I speak about it, I must declare my bias. I’m a member, was the President of the NWEP for two years, and I still take an active role in many NWEP initiatives. So, yeah, I’m going to the AGM, and hope some of you will as well.

Sometimes the NWEP is out at community events, manning the booth as in the photo above, and people ask what we do. The quick answer is “lots”.

It can be summarized in our Mission:

To work with residents, businesses, and government agencies within the city, as well as regional (locally connected) environmental groups, to achieve environmental, social and economic sustainability in New Westminster through the identification of issues, education, public advocacy, the promotion of best practices, and the implementation of effective projects.

But that doesn’t really say what the NWEP does.

It was a group of NWEP folks a few years ago who found a common interest in seeing a Farmers Market in New Westminster – and the RCFM was built. Another group of people got together at an NWEP meeting, lamenting the lack of Community gardens in New Westminster, and from those seeds the New Westminster Community Gardening Society grew. When one of our more astounding volunteer members saw a niche for Documentary Films in New West, he got a group together, and with NWEP help, started the New West Doc Fest.

All of these organizations are up and running outside of the envelope of the NWEP, and all credit goes to those organizations and their volunteers for the successes they have seen in the last couple of years. The role of the NWEP is not to run organizations like this, or even to take credit for them, but to bring people together so that these types of things can ferment in the City.

The NWEP has also spent a lot of time engaging the public and decision-makers on issues of sustainability. We lobbied the City effectively during the transition to automated trash collection and organics separation, then worked with the City and MetroVancouver to outreach at community events to prepare people for the transition. We were up front on the UBE issue, and continue to follow the ongoing saga of the Pattullo Bridge replacement.

We also have also brought the potential decision makers together with voters in a couple of very popular “All Candidates Meet & Greets” during the previous couple of elections (I love how the first word on that poster is a typo – volunteers!), and working with our friends at Tenth to the Fraser, we brought the subject of “Sustainability” (plagiarized or not) to the last municipal election. More recently some of our volunteers have organized a couple of massively-successful Shoreline Cleanups in Queensborough, with invaluable assitance from the City.

All this with a few volunteers and a bank account that rarely sees three figures.

So I am hoping I make the case that the NWEP is a force towards good in the City, and something you should support. So what does “support” look like?

#1: Go to the AGM Monday. There will be a couple of great speakers talking about, of all things, sustainability and community engagement. It will be a fun, social evening, the talks will be informative and relatively brief, and we will have lots of time to meet and greet, hang out, and talk City.

#2: Join the NWEP. It costs you $5, but it provides the group the ability to speak with a louder voice, and to draw on a larger group of volunteers when need arises. Many hands make light work.

#3: Bring your ideas about what the City needs to be more sustainable. You might find some folks who share your interest, and are willing to work with you to see it happen. Or you might hear someone else’s idea, and decide you want to help with that. “Helping” can me as simple as bringing an idea, or providing a few hours of volunteer time and energy, or knowing a contact person to bring groups together under a common cause, or even just acting as a sounding board for ideas to tease out their viability.

Doesn’t that just sound like “building community”?

Time to start Naming Names

Posted on . by Patrick Johnstone. Leave a comment.

I’m going to stop apologizing for not writing more often. I’m freaking busy, OK? Get off my back! (Hi Mom!)

There are no less than three names that need naming in New West over the next year or two.

The School board is currently asking the public to propose names for the two new schools that are going to be built in the next couple of years – the Elementary School on the old St. Mary’s Hospital site, and the Middle school to be built on the John Robson school site. Also, the City is starting to throw around the idea of a proper name for the “Multi-Use Civic Facility” building downtown, as no-one sees “MUCF” as a keeper. The unique part of this is that the City is discussing options around selling the naming rights to the centre to cover some of the operational costs.

Since it is time-sensitive, let’s talk Schools first. The Board of Education wants your ideas and opinions, at least until October 31st. Both school sites present interesting opportunities to look at the past and look forward.

The School we have been calling the St. Mary’s Site, for example, could be called St. Mary’s Elementary, to honour the history of the hospital, although that may create both good and bad associations for people, depending on how you view the closing of the facility (I recommend Jaimie McEvoy’s book for a comprehensive history of the Hospital) or the use of Christian Symbols for naming public institutions. However, the Hospital could also be remembered by honoring the people who played an important role in the Hospital’s History (such as Esther Pariseau or Florence Hagarty… just as examples; I leave it to better historians than I to sift through the history of that site).

The first question I would have about the naming of the Middle School on the John Robson site, is who was John Robson, and is there any reason not to carry on his legacy with the new school on the same site? The guy was New Westminster founder, newspaper editor, early Town Councillor in New West and eventually Premier of the Province. He was also an outspoken advocate for public education. It would be a shame to lose that naming legacy.

However, what about New Westminster people who might fittingly be honoured with having a school named for them, and may create a more personal association for today an tomorrow’s Middle-School students? I have heard the name Eva Markvoort suggested, but maybe there are other important people in New Westminster’s more recent history the Board of Education may consider?

I guess I am of the type who feels Schools should be named after people, preferably local historical figures. Even if I shamefully still can’t tell you who Stanley Humphries actually was!

Meanwhile, The City was wondering if we should sell the name to the MUCF, but have now apparently taken that off the table. This will probably generate a healthy debate – the idea of selling the name of a publicly-financed and publicly-built community centre to a Corporation just rubs a lot of people the wrong way. However, some would suggest the City, already facing criticism over some financial risks taken on the MUCF/Office Tower, shouldn’t turn down the steady income stream from naming rights. There are some people in this town who will accuse the City of doing it wrong, no matter what they do, leaving us with the less desirable judgement call if the revenue generated will outweigh the controversy generated. Alas, Remember the quasi-controversy around the non-naming of BC Place?

So in the short-term we probably need to put the corporate naming issue aside, and concentrate on a good name for the centre, regardless of whether a corporation can attach their name to the side of it.

As this is a City facility, and it is an Arts and Culture facility (as opposed to a sports facility), you would think we cold find a name that represents the Arts and Culture of the City. Like many in this City, I could see this being part of the Hyack tradition in the City. I proffered, tongue somewhat in cheek: The Hyackulum. Sounds historic, monumental, eternal, and includes the Hyack tradition! The XL Meats Hyackulum! You heard it hear first.

But all that Hyack talk got me thinking about Muni Evers. He was the longest serving mayor of the City (13 years) and was Mayor when the City founded the Hyack Society. His reasoning at the time was that he thought the City needed some “spark”, which is a curious 1970s version of exactly what we are hoping the MUCF does for us now. Evers was a WW2 veteran, a pharmacist, and Member of the Order of Canada. When he left office in 1982, I was a 12-year not looking forward to my 4 years at Stanley Humphries, so I have no memory of Mayor Evers’ politics, personality, or profile. However, he served the City longer than any other mayor, and he helped build the institution that has been at the centre of almost every annual event that we, in New Westminster, call our own. Maybe having his name on the side of the MUCF – say the Muni Evers Cultural Centre – might be a nice way to honour the contribution. ?

Photo of a snappy Muni Every in his Air Force uniform in 1940,
Courtesy of stolen from The Jewish Historical Society of British Columbia website.

I even like the fact his name creates an interesting play on words, suggesting a permanent legacy for the community. Best part of all, you just can’t stick a Corporate Label on the front of that name. 

Doc Fest Weekend!

Posted on . by Patrick Johnstone. Leave a comment.

Yep, still busy. So I’m not blogging much.

There is lots coming up in the next few weeks: an event for which I need to write a speech (hint: it is at the Inn at the Quay),  another event where I get to look good by surrounding myself with many smarter, more accomplished and successful people than myself (hint: it is also at the Inn at the Quay), an event where I need to have a costume (Hint: it is at Status Nightclub), and an event where I might get gang-pressed into more volunteering (Hint: it is at the River Market).

Oh, and curling season has begun, work is crazy busy, and we have two separate contractors do two different projects for us, both of which were supposed to be done before the rains started. Alas, it has been a long time since I was bored.

However, if you have any risk of being bored, or even if you don’t, you should be at the Second Annual New West DocFest this weekend at Douglas College!

The Doc Fest starts Friday Night at 7:00, with a showing of “Chasing Ice”: a beautiful doc about glaciers, ice sheets, and the efforts a group of people put into capturing them on film before they go away…

And on the topic of Glaciers going away, Nobel Laureate and Sustainability Economist Marc Jaccard will be at the event Friday, and doing some Q&A about the state of the climate. I suspect it ain’t gonna be good news, but you might learn something important.

There will also be other events happening around the Friday Night opening reception, a good time guaranteed to most!

Saturday will see no less than four feature-length documentaries (One about young women growing up under disparate cultural influences in India; one about the impact of Bituminous Sand development on Canada’s fresh water ecosystems; one on the culture within the Canadian gaming community; and one about a filmmaker making a controversial film, and the controversy that ensues when the subject tries to stop him from releasing it) and a couple of short films, Q&A sessions on the topics of the films, a live theatre event, live music… too many things going on to describe them all.

You can see one movie for $7, or you can get a weekend pass for $20 and come and go as you please. It is a smoking good deal to see award-winning movies here in New West. And the weather is going to be terrible, so best spend your time inside a dark room being entertained.

Now I gotta go write a speech….