Tag: Acting Locally

Master Transportation Plan and Complete Streets.

Posted on . by Patrick Johnstone. 3 Comments.

I posted this picture last week as a bit of a joke, but it really isn’t that funny to people who try to use bikes to get about. The Internet is full of ridiculous images of bicycle infrastructure build in such a way that it completely fails as bicycle infrastructure. The blog Bike Snob NYC always has great photos of these types of things, but they can be found anywhere transportation engineers try to fit a bike lane on the side of a road built for cars. 

It isn’t just the engineers. Bike lanes are used as bus stops, as right turn lanes, as defacto parking spots, as loading zones, as trash dumps, as construction staging areas, and as walkways. It is no wonder cyclists often feel safer on the sidewalk.
I was in a Public meeting where a Transportation Engineer for a major City in the Lower Mainland opined that cyclists got no respect from drivers because they were always hopping on and off of the sidewalks and no-one knew if they were pedestrians or cars. My only response to this is that cyclists do what they can with the infrastructure they are given. Hopping on and off is a sidewalk is actually quite the hassle for a cyclist when they really just want to be where they feel safest, and at times that is the sidewalk, at times that is the street. If the transition between the two is erratic, that is a damnation of the transportation engineer, not the cyclist. 
The problem is usually found in how old-school transportation engineers see bicycles and pedestrians: as things to accommodate as best as you can while building a road for cars and trucks. A “transportation” project is building a road, a bridge, or an overpass. After the road is designed to accommodate the traffic as best as possible. Then is the time to have the baubles attached: sidewalks and bike paths (if the budget allows).
There is a better way. There is a movement in the Excited States to encourage local governments to adopt a “Complete Streets Policy“. In essence, Complete Streets are those:

“…designed and operated to enable safe access for all users. Pedestrians, bicyclists, motorists and transit riders of all ages and abilities must be able to safely move along and across a complete street.

The idea is that pedestrian and cycling infrastructure, along with infrastructure to allow people with mobility challenges to get around, are integrated in to the design at the top level, not added on a baubles afterwards. 
New Westminster is actually not too bad at this, really. Compared to other jurisdictions, we have a pretty pedestrian-friendly City. Those sidewalk bumps installed on Royal Ave that were the source of much mirth this previous election season are a relatively successful product of adding pedestrian-friendly elements to an infrastructure designed to move cars. Part of this might be a result of the “Pedestrian Charter” that the City established a few years ago. 
This doesn’t mean that all is well. The ongoing saga of 5th and 5th, where changes of the intersection to accommodate grocery trucks resulted in completely untenable compromises for pedestrians and cyclists, is an example of one user’s needs being met without consideration of the other users. 
So I am suggesting that the City’s Master Transportation Plan include a reccommendation to adopt a home-grown Complete Streets Policy. This will expand the idea of the Pedestrians Charter to include all users: pedestrians, cyclists, transit users, the mobility challenged, and those who, but choice or by neccessity, are stuck behind windshields. There are lots of examples available on-line of Complete Street Policies created by other jurisdictions, and one could easily be adapted to the New Westminster situation. 
Instead of figuring out ways to accommodate “alternative” users, we can design our roads and sidewalks and bike paths and green ways to work together to move all users through as efficiently as possible. Who can argue with that?

My reign-ending speech

Posted on . by Patrick Johnstone. Leave a comment.

The New Westminster Environmental Partners held their Annual General Meeting last week. It was a good event, with a couple of guest speakers talking about Energy Resiliency, or the challenges and opportunities that we face going into a reduced-greenhouse-gas and post-peak-oil economy. The event attendance was O.K., but could have been better.true to various planning conflicts, the only date we could hold the event happened to be on the same day that New Westminster was inaugurating it’s new City Council, so A lot of the movers and shakers in town were up at City Hall. We still had representation for the City and a couple of the candidates from the last election in attendance, and a diverse group of people, many I have not seen at an NWEP event before, which was great to see.


Since it was the Annual General Meeting , I was required to give a “State of the Partners” speech. People who know me know I can tend to run on, but am not that good reading from a script, so I had some notes and started rambling from them. Here, for the record, is a roughly accurate but in no way transcribed transcript of my speech. 

Hello and thank you for coming. It is my last task as President of the NWEP to provide a State of the Society speech. I am Patrick Johnstone, and I have been working as President of the NWEP for two years, not since the beginning of the NWEP, but since the beginning of the NWEP as a registered non-profit society. 

The NWEP mission is on our website and reads as such:

New Westminster Environmental Partners will work with residents, businesses and government agencies within the city, 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.


So maybe I can highlight a few ways we have fulfilled this mission since last year’s AGM.

Actually, it started with last year’s AGM, when we held a forum on Sustainable Transportation. The thinking at the time was the upcoming Master Transportation Plan for the City, the potential impacts off the Gateway Program on New Westminster, and the ongoing debate about TransLink governance and funding issues around starting work on the Evergreen Line. It was a great discussion, and remarkably prescient, considering that only 9 days after our 2010 AGM, was the infamous “Donnybrook” TransLink open house that introduced the United Boulevard Extension to the people of New Westminster.

Fresh from sharing new ideas on Sustainable Transportation at last year’s forum, the NWEP Transportation Group got very involved in the UBE consultations, and worked with the  MSRA, VACC, and the Council of Canadians, to see that any project that came forward supported sustainable transportation planning. When it became apparent that this project was going to have significant negative impacts on the livability of New Westminster, The Transportation group were pretty happy to see TransLink recognize that their plans did not meet the expectations of the community and call off the UBE. A year later, the City is planning to develop our waterfront to be human space, now that the North Fraser Perimeter Road is no longer threatening to replace our waterfront with a freeway.

There were critics of TransLink and the consultation process, and there were those calling for protest and taking a more confrontational approach, but the NWEP are not all that good at protest. We have more commonly taken an engagement approach. The UBE experience showed that this approach can be effective. This consultation did not end with the cancellation of the UBE – but continued, as the Transportation Group has continued to engage stakeholders, including a presentation to the TransLink board, on addressing ongoing goods and people movement issues in New Westminster.

Another thing the NWEP did this year is improve our on-line presence, with a new website (NWEP.CA). First off, it looks great, and the architecture is, I’m told, much more modern and easier to manage. The Matts – Lorenzi and Laird – have put in a lot of time and a lot of their combined techie knowledge into making it work, and I thank them. Now that the structure is good, we need to put a bit of effort as a larger group into adding content and applications to it, to give people a reason to come to the site on a regular basis. we have also reached out in the Social Media with a more active Facebook Page ( or group or like or whatever Facebook is calling it this week) and a Twitter presence.

There were two elections this year – federal and municipal. The NWEP is non-partisan as an organization, but that doesn’t mean our members don’t have opinions! However, as most NWEP members think sustainability should be on every party’s and candidate’s platform – we have seen our role as assuring that those issues become part of the conversation during the election cycle. We did this in two ways:

   -Working with 10th to the Fraser, we created candidate surveys asking questions relevant to sustainability to hear where the different candidates stand on these issues, and provided the answers for the public to review.

  – Working again with 10th to the Fraser and NEXT New West, we held an all-candidates event for each election.  Instead of having another dull debate-style meeting in a school gym with bad acoustics and worse communications,  we held more social meetings where speeches were kept to a minimum and the voters were encouraged to have one-on-one conversations with the candidates. This allowed the public to actually meet the Candidates, learn who they are, and have their concerns addressed on a more personal level. These events were incredibly well received by both the voters and the candidates, and I hope this is a model that spreads across the land. 

This year saw the first annual New West Doc Fest, organized mostly by Andrew Murray working with the Green Ideas Network. This was an incredibly well-run and well-received event. For people running a film festival for the first time, it went brilliantly, technically perfect, lots of interesting movies and other entertainment opportunities, and a chance to expand the sustainability conversation in the city. Far a first year, this was a great chance to work out the bugs or running this type of event, and still ended up running a small surplus to serve as seed funding for next year’s Fest. The NWEP role in the Doc Fest was to provide logistical support, some banking help, and a ton of volunteer help.

New Westminster’s local public contribution to the Great Canadian Shoreline Cleanup was largely the result of a lot of hard work by Karla Olsen. We worked with the City’s environment and engineering departments, and with Evergreen to pull it off.  A group of public volunteers, including two City Councillors,  collected 95 kg of trash from the Queensborough shoreline, and did a concentrated invasive species pull: saving a Douglas fir from an English ivy attack, and knocking back a patch of Japanese Knotweed to keep the shoreline as pristine as possible. This was all because Karla thought it would be a good idea, and found a group of people at the NWEP to help out, provide some  facilitating contacts, and some media connections. Again, we just provided resources and assistance, this is an event that was powered my a small group of volunteers and took Karla’s persistence and unrelenting energy to be successful. 

This is an important thing about how the NWEP works. The NWEP is not a board of 7 people who come up with ideas about how to save the world, then tell the membership to go do it. The model we have been operating on is one where the members bring ideas to meetings, and find like-minded people to help out. The job of the board is to provide the structure that allows us to operate under the Societies Act – structures like this AGM. Structures like a bank account and financial documentation to apply for grants, get appropriate insurance, or attract sponsors for things like the New West Doc Fest. Structures like a volunteer core and a network in the media and in the City to help the members’s ideas see the light of day like we did in the Shoreline Cleanup. 

If you are familiar with Venn diagrams: that is what the member list of the NWEP might look like. The NWEP have various groups like the Transportation Group, the Energy Group, the Trash Talkers, and a Board, and like spheres in a Venn Diagram, these groups overlap somewhat. When a new set of issues come up, or an initiative comes up, we don’t look to the board to organize it, we look at who might be interested, and get them involved. 

This model doesn’t work perfectly. Often people have ideas that are great, but we don’t have the critical mass of members or volunteers to make it happen. Sometimes the group can’t come up with the strategy of how to move an initiative forward.  But this model allows a small group of volunteers to concentrate on things for which they have a passion, and to assure you are never, as a volunteer, stuck doing something you do not believe in.  One thing that doesn’t work in this model is for someone to come to an NWEP meeting and say “you should do something about X”. Whenever someone says that to me, I reply: “you are right, you should do something! maybe we can help…” 

So maybe you came here tonight with an idea about what the NWEP should be doing, or maybe today’s talk by our speakers will spark an idea that you think deserves following up here in New West…If those happen, then I ask you to consider what you think you can do, and how you think the NWEP can help.  

So thank you for coming out and listening to my pitch, thank you to the many people I see out there who helped on one or more initiatives this year. As I said, I have decided not to serve a third term as President, as I think fresh ideas bring renewed energy. I am going to keep working with the NWEP, though, because I think we do good work, punch well above our weight, and that the organization is making New Westminster a better place to live and do business. So thank you all for caring enough to do what you can.
As I have told several people who asked, I am not leaving the NWEP, nor is there some sort of rift in the group (at least not that I’m aware of!) However, as a relatively young organization, I think it is good if we provide lots of opportunities for different people to set the vision. The standing Directors going into the second year of their terms (Vladimir Krasnogor, Andrew Murray and Marcel Pitre) are complimented by the re-elected Founder of the NWEP Matt Laird; long time Trash Talker and Energy Group activist Ginny Ayers; renowned cyclist, physicist, and knitter Reena Meijer Drees; and author and organizer Karla Olsen. It is a good team, and I hope to see good things in the next year. I’ll be there as Past President serving as a non-voting board member. I also have a few creative ideas about projects for next year, but will wait until the first NWEP meeting in January to talk about those.

Here comes the Pattullo

Posted on . by Patrick Johnstone. Leave a comment.
It seems that the City’s Master Transportation Plan might not be the biggest transportation story in the New Year.
TransLink is once again launching public consultations on the replacement for the Pattullo Bridge, early in 2012. Lucky for us, TransLink provides lots of on-line material to review before we enter the consultation phase. I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again, for all of their faults, TransLink has been doing a good job in public consultation. 
If I can be reductionist, I think we can summarize the discussion around the Pattullo as coming down to three questions: Fix or replace; How many lanes; and whether to toll or not. As you might expect, I have opinions on each of these. 
On the first question, there is a lot of material on the TransLink site that addresses this question, summing up to a pretty compelling argument. As much as I love the aesthetics of the old steel arch-truss, it seems the bridge is reaching the end of it’s service life. The steel and concrete are deteriorating, the bridge does not meet modern seismic standards, and the way the bridge interacts with the river is not what would be considered good engineering practice in 2011. 
If one wanted to counter this argument, we could point at dozens of older bridges around the world that are built with similar materials, and that all of these issues could be addressed with a serious refurbishment of the existing structure, but I a not going to doubt the engineers when they say that the cost-benefit math for replacement just works out better. Reuse and recycling are good ideas, but so is efficient use of limited public funds. If the business case for replacement is better that repair, then that is the way to go.
The one part of the TransLink argument about replacement I will argue is the “traffic safety issue”. The fact there has not been a serious accident on the bridge since the evening lane closures were introduced shows that traffic management can deal with the safety on the bridge. I’m not the first to note that enforcing the 50 km/h speed limit with photo radar would be a cheap and easy way to essentially remove the risk of fatal head-ons, but apparently, votes are more important than public safety. That said, the current Pattullo is one of the worst crossings for pedestrians and (especially) bikes, so as a price of sustainable transportation infrastructure, it fails.
So question #1 seems to be settled in TransLink’s mind. They are going to replace the bridge at some point before the old one falls down. Therefore the consultation is going to focus on how they replace it. 
Which brings us to Question #2: How many lanes. 
The consultation materials are, up to here, a little vague on the lane count issue. They mention that four-lane and six-lane options are on the table. It is only in the March 2011 Options Assessment Report done by Delcan where there is any discussion of the lane count, and the summary is thus:
A new six lane bridge will provide opportunities to improve the connectivity on both sides of the river with additional connections to both the North Fraser Perimeter Road and the South Fraser Perimeter Road. The additional lane in each direction, as compared to the existing bridge or a new four lane bridge, will provide improved operations across the river, especially for large trucks travelling across the bridge to / from the regionally significant Perimeter Roads.
So the justification for extra lanes seems based on the increased traffic demand created by the South and North Fraser Perimeter Roads. Clearly this was written prior to the NFPR being abandoned. They also make it clear that the new Pattullo will not be connected to Front Street, but will remain connected to Royal and McBride. So the first question we should be answering in New Westminster is if we are ready and willing to accept a 50% increase in traffic arriving from the Pattullo. We know that traffic will go along McBride to 10th, along Royal to Stewardson, and along East Columbia to Brunette. Any suggestion that an increase in Pattullo lanes will reduce traffic congestion in New Westminster are, frankly, preposterous.
I think the most rational approach for New Westminster is to build a 4-lane replacement. Coincidentally, this may be the most radical approach as well. Think about it, a major piece of automobile infrastructure replaced with infrastructure of the same size. I don’t think it has ever been done in Greater Vancouver. It would put into steel and concrete the ideals that both the Regional District and TransLink have been talking about for decades: Planning for more a sustainable transportation system; encouraging Transit use and active transportation options, building more compact, transit-oriented neighborhoods so people need to drive less. 
If the region and TransLink are serious about planning for a post-Peak Oil era, if the Province and the Region are serious about managing their Green House Gas emissions, if Diane Watts wants serious investment in Rapid Transit for South of the Fraser, and if New Westminster is ready to hold the line on ever-increasing traffic on it’s local roads, then let’s have the courage to build a 4-lane Pattullo and put our money where our ideals are. 
Question #3 is a big one, and I think I will hold off on commenting about that until another post. 

On Kyoto (the Block, not the Accord)

Posted on . by Patrick Johnstone. 3 Comments.

I have a real love-hate thing going on with the Planning Department in New Westminster. Well, “hate” is too strong a word; let’s call it love-like somewhat less.

During the recent election, I noted the incredible progress the City has made over the last decade. The Downtown, 12 Street, Sapperton, the waterfront trails in Queensborough: there is a lot of great stuff going on. During the election, I mostly gave the kudos to the politicians running the place, but equal (or greater?) credit has to go to the planners in the City who help bring the visions of multiple parties (developers, council, neighbourhoods, third party stakeholders, rabble-rousers) together into what will hopefully be the best possible compromise to move the City forward.

The revitalization of the Downtown is ongoing and already showing significant dividends. As I mentioned last year, the building of the MUCF at 8th and Columbia will be an important piece in this puzzle, as will the opening of the retail spaces at the New Westminster Station, the date of which was just announced. However, I remain highly critical of how the pedestrian experience of this keystone entrance to our new Downtown is being managed. Today, the City will officially decide to shut down the 8th Street crosswalk that is so heavily used (and would continue to be used as the preferable pedestrian route to the MUCF), its timing not exactly coincident with the building of alternative routes, but with the need to accommodate a staging area for the Santa Claus Parade. Alas.

What concerns me more, though, is that the City is finally making public announcements about what has been rumoured for the last year or two: they want someone to build a hotel on the Kyoto block, the recently-demolished set of buildings on the north-west corner of 8th and Columbia, immediately adjacent the entrance escalator to the New Westminster Station.

Potentially sticking another big pedestrian roadblock at the entrance to our downtown, and turning over what could be a precious piece of public open space – one that belongs to the City – into another high-rise development.

Back when I was winging about how the MUCF essentially turned it’s back on 8th Street and the Skytrain Station, my main complaint was one of potential lost opportunity. With Plaza 88 bringing people into New Westminster to go to the new theatres, there is a great opportunity to draw those people onto Columbia for the new eating, drinking and shopping opportunities that are being developed there. Tying these to the River Market via an upgraded pedestrian overpass behind Hyack square would be a bonus.

Now that 8th Street will be inevitably lost as pedestrian space, the question remains how we will draw people to Columbia Street. The answer seems to be down a shadowy narrow escalator, past a couple of loading bays in the shadow of big buildings. We can do better.

Imagine Kyoto Plaza (actually imagine a better name, but stay with me here…), an 6000-square foot open space across Columbia Street from similar-sized Hyack Square. To the west is the concrete wall of the Plaza 88 Theatres, adorned with green and/or water features, and cut by a curving, pedestrian ramp carrying people down from the New West Station concourse, giving them a grand view of the streetscape below and to the east. In the centre of the plaza sloping up to the ramp are planters, seating areas, maybe even a fountain, to compliment the architecture of Hyack Square across the street. The intersection of 8th and Columbia will be wide, and slightly elevated, perhaps in the “pedestrian scramble” design, to link together open spaces north and south, and to provide a visual entrance to Columbia Street for cars approaching from the east.

Let’s give people a reason to step out of Plaza 88, and at first look towards Columbia Street, then go down there and spend some money. Let’s give the office workers and visitors of the new MUCF an open space to sit, soak up sun, eat lunch. Let’s give people walking from other neighbourhoods, people arriving by car or by Skytrain a place to meet up before going for a drink, for dinner, or for a movie.

Let people’s first impression of the Royal City when they get off the SkyTrain be of an open, happening, safe and comfortable place with lots to offer, instead of a dark tunnel-like walking route past parking garage entrances and high-rises.

Come to think of it, we can even support the Downtown BIA’s never-satiated hunger for more parking by providing 3 floors of underground parking, similar to the MUCF, and add 150 spots to the downtown inventory (or maybe 200 if we link to the MUCF using the area under 8th Street), while still keeping the ground level as human, pedestrian space.

I have nothing against hotels, and recognize it is an asset the City could use more of. I doubt whether this is the best space for it. There are lots of 6500-square foot footprints in downtown where an interested business can stick a boutique hotel, there are very few open spaces that are in the possession of the City and serve as the entrance to our Downtown for visitors arriving by car and by transit, and as a link between our main shopping street, our eponymous Transit Centre, and our Waterfront Market. We have an opportunity to alleviate the unfortunate loss of pedestrian space around the MUCF with some visionary planning right now, and benefit the entire downtown retail area with some creative land use decisions here. Let’s not lose this second chance.

C’mon Planning Department, Make me love you again…

It’s all over but the voting

Posted on . by Patrick Johnstone. 1 Comment.

I was tossed up about doing “endorsements” this election. There are three kinds of people who read this blog: one third people who agree with me (and therefore are probably going to vote for the same people as me anyway), one third who hate me (and who will probably not be voting for anyone I support anyway), and my Mom (who can’t vote in New West). So I don’t think anyone’s political fate is in my hands. That said, in my work with several not-for-profits, I need to work with whomever is elected, so I don’t want to step on too many toes here. There are a couple of candidates I support strongly and publicly, so I may as well explain why.

The funny part with Municipal elections is that you can vote for many people, but you probably shouldn’t. If you fill the top of your ballot with people you like, then just fill the bottom with random names to fill space, you may actually push one of those random people over the top, potentially pushing one of your favourites out of a seat. So the best strategy is to pick the candidates you like, only vote for them, and keep the rest of your ballot blank. I suspect I will only be voting for 4 or 5 councillors, and maybe 5 school trustees. Most of my picks will remain between me and the ballot box, with these exceptions:

Jonathan Cote is, to me, the model of an excellent City Councillor. I have served on a committee that he chairs, and he has a remarkable ability to make a committee work. He keeps the conversation flowing while staying on track, lets everyone be heard, and then very effrctively condenses the mood of the committee into simple and actionable ideas and items. There is an art and a skill to running a meeting, and he is a skilled artist at it. He has also been one of the easiest Councillors to approach and have an in-depth discussion with over any of a range of topics.

I also had the opportunity to go door-knocking with Jonathan this election, and was astonished to hear his breadth of knowledge of topics that people raised. He also demonstrated that he actually listened to people. At times an issue would come up at one door, and he would say “yes, I agree, the City should look at that”, and it sounds to the cynic like political platitude to get a vote. However, 10 minutes and 4 doors later, we would be walking on the sidewalk and Jonathan would raise that topic, and say “that point they raised back there, is actually a complicated subject, it isn’t black and white…” or “I wonder how Calgary is so successful at managing that issue…”, showing that he had been thinking about the issue in the back of his mind since we left the door- and was already considering how to move forward with it. He didn’t just listen he heard, and he stored the memory.

Jonathan is smart, dedicated, and hardworking, He has demonstrated a genuine desire to learn the craft of running a City (taking time from his already-crazy life to take Graduate courses at SFU in Urban Planning). He has a positive vision for the future of the City, and he cares about getting there so he can raise his young family in the best City possible. I’m also pretty invested in New West, and I want someone who is thinking long-term running the place. I wish I could vote for Jonathan twice.

When I first met Jaimie McEvoy through the NWEP, I wasn’t sure what to think. I remember voting for him last election because of his environmental cred, but didn’t know much more about him. Since he was elected, though, I have interacted with him a lot, and have been pleasantly surprised by his knowledge of the City, his ideas about public policy, and his passion about all three pillars of sustainability. He provided a ton of useful advice during the UBE consultations, and that was where he first demonstrated to me his political savvy. During this election, he is one of the few candidates I have seen take task with another candidate (one he was not even running against!) when he felt the other was not being truthful. He didn’t call him out during the debate, but he approached him after with very few of us in earshot and tore a strip off the candidate in a quiet voice. He was respectful, but spoke with a real passion about honesty. It is inspirational to hear him speak about social justice issues in the City, especially the Living Wage policy. I even read his book, and the guy can actually write!

Jaimie is progressive, passionate, and actually cares about building community, and I am proud to support him.

Here are the reasons I am supporting Wayne Wright for Mayor.

The best answer is I look at the City now compared to how it was in the year 2000, and I can’t help but admit it is a much friendlier, cleaner, safer, and more prosperous community. The growth has been reasonable and generally positive; there are more businesses opening up; and there are areas of Sapperton, Downtown, and 12th Street that are vastly different places now than 9 years ago… all changes in the positive direction. Of course there are both external and internal reasons for these changes, but ultimately, Wayne has been the guy steering the ship, and I like the route the ship is on.

This does not mean I agree with every move he has made, or every position he holds. I think WTE is the wrong direction to go for our City and for our region, and I think he will need to be a strong voice in the City against moving in that direction. When the UBE issue first arose, I thought his initial reaction of surprise at how concerned his citizens were about the project was disappointing, as were his complaints that no-one had done anything about Front Street Traffic for 10 years (not noting that he was the one who probably should have been doing something). That said, now that the NFPR is all but dead, the moves the City is making to return the waterfront to space useable by the citizens of New Westminster (as opposed to the victim of short-term patchwork solutions to other City’s bad planning) is a positive step, and indeed visionary.

In my experience, Wayne has been accessible, honest, and respectful with his dealings with the residents, with developers, and with our regional partners. He is a consensus-builder who is respected by his council partners, by the City staff, and by his regional partners, and that is important if we want to get things done. Also, when push comes to shove, he has demonstrated that he is not unwilling to challenge the “regional consensus”, and will take our regional partners to task if the people of New Westminster tell him that is what we want. In the end, these are the characteristics of a good Mayor.

If I had any criticism of his campaign, it is that the whole affair seemed too passive. He spoke very well at the All Candidates events I have seen, but I would have liked to have seen him take a more aggressive approach towards some of the criticism sent towards him and his council partners. I think most of the criticism of him has been disingenuous or just plain inaccurate, and I kind of which he had taken that on a little stronger. Perhaps he felt it more important to stay above the muck and keep on the positive, so he ran on a record to be proud of and his ability to work with others. I am just afraid his low-key campaign coupled with the very aggressive, populist campaign he is up against will result in an election very similar to Langley Township on 2008. And we all know how well that turned out.

Which brings us to the subject of James Crosty.

I consider James a friend, and think that his heart is in the right place. He has worked hard for many years to build community in New Westminster, and his contributions to this City deserve respect. When his Astroturf organization was collecting signatures at the Quayside Festival, I signed the petition, but I put a note beside my signature: “I want you to run, but that doesn’t mean I’m going to vote for you!” I told him personally that he was going to have to earn my vote.

Unfortunately, he has not done that. He has had a few gaffes in the campaign, and I don’t want to go there, because those happen to those brave enough to take risks. My problem is more in the lack of concrete ideas about ways to improve the City, and the few ideas I did hear were, IMHO, bonkers (McBride tunnel?!). Even more than that, the tone of the discussion from his side was a negative one. From the beginning, he has been combative and vocally critical of the present Mayor and administration, suggesting everything from gross mismanagement to fiscal dishonesty, with very little evidence or demonstration of alternatives. His promotion company has been Tweeting a constant stream of criticism of the Mayor that got pretty tired pretty early. Then, when anyone suggests the James might be negative, his ideas might be off the mark, or presents countering evidence to one of his claims, instead of addressing the criticism honestly and openly, he has tended to deal with these things with an attitude I have heard described as “passive-aggressive”. Having challenged him a few times myself, I know where that description comes from.

His listening exercises (Citizen Chats) were a good idea, but I saw little evidence that he learned anything at those meetings. His latest ads list a series of issues for each neighbourhood, but no solutions, no context to them, and they were mostly things that he raised early in the campaign. James and I talked transportation several times, but I don’t think he understood what I was saying, or just couldn’t address it in the scope of his campaign. In the end, I did not see, during the campaign, an example of someone with the ability to develop workable solutions, make council work effectively, get the best out of City Staff, or to protect the City’s interests amongst regional partners while finding consensus with them.

So I hope Wayne is re-elected this time, because I like the path we are on, and I’m not convinced a change at this time is needed. I hope James keeps playing his important role in the community. I also hope he spends the next three years reviewing what went right and wrong in his campaign, and continues to engage in real two-way dialogue with some of the innovative thinkers in this City (we have a lot of them!). From that will come a set of compelling ideas for moving the City forward, the foundation for building consensus, and a platform of positive changes.

Then in 2014, James can give Chuck Puchmayr a real challenge for the Mayor’s chair. Boy, will that be a fun race to watch!

Mayor Nantel?

Posted on . by Patrick Johnstone. 1 Comment.

UPDATE: He’s on Twitter! And apparently following Bill Gates and Bill Vander Zalm. oh boy.

I’ve said it before, I’ll say it again, I’ve been asking it around town for a week and a half, and no-one can answer: Who the hell is Francois Nantel?

This municipal election we have no less than four people running for Mayor. Besides the Incumbent, we have Vance McFayden, a long-time resident and community builder, and we have Citizen Advocate James Crosty, and you all know who he is. The mystery to me is Francois Nantel.

Notably, last time Francois was on a ballot in New Westminster was the federal election of 2000, I was living in Illinois (the only Federal Election I have missed since the one a couple of weeks after my 19th birthday when I was living in the crappy apartment on Royal Ave…), but he ran for the federal Green Party! I’m not trying to suggest I am all things “green” in New West, but if I don’t know who this guy is, he has a serious name-recognition problem.

I spent several years serving on the local Green Party EDA (but am not a member of the party any longer… another post, another time), and I have helped the campaigns of Carrie McLaren, Marshall Smith, and Rebecca Helps, but I don’t remember him being at any of those meetings. A couple of friends I have are attached to the Provincial Party, and they have no idea who he is. He isn’t “friends” on Facebook with any of the Green Party Candidates in New West over the last 10 years. So, I guess his ties with the Green Party are pretty severed.

What about community groups? The New Westminster Environmental Partners have been at the forefront of numerous environmental issues in the City over the last few years, from the UBE to solid waste to community gardens, but I don’t remember Francois ever taking part. Neither do the members who started the group before I got active.

There are several citizen committees in New West, but I don’t see his name listed on any of the committees in 2010 or 2011. As a resident of the West End, he is a member of the West End Residents Association, one of the most active in the City, who post their minutes on-line. Mr. Nantel’s name is conspicuously absent .

I asked one of the longer-serving City Councillors on Friday night, and he said “I think he popped up about 10 years ago, angry about Wal Mart, but I don’t know where he has been since…”

I searched the minutes of every Council Meeting in 2011, and I did not find one reference to Mr. Nantel: no delegations, no correspondence. I assume he watched a few of them on TV! If he has any opinions about what he saw, he sure didn’t share them, as searches for “Nantel” of both the News Leader and the Record come up with only a few hits, all of them from the last two weeks, and all little more than mentions that he is running for mayor.

The record article is most concerning. Apparently, this run for Mayor is just a “stepping stone” to bigger, better things in Federal Politics. Yikes. Not a good sign for local leadership.

You know, I have been asking candidates two things this election: don’t go negative, and show me your vision. So I am going to avoid being negative, and accentuate the positive here. I am happy Francois Nantel has shown us what his vision for New Westminster is: a stepping stone in his rear-view mirror as he flies off to Ottawa. Bonne chance, mon frère.

New West Doc Fest – Day 2

Posted on . by Patrick Johnstone. Leave a comment.

It was quite the full day! Besides taking tickets, helping promote the NWEP at the booth, and visiting with folks, I still got to see most of the films, although I did not get to spend as much time in the Q&A sessions as I would have liked.

The day began with a short called “The Most Livable City”, which talked about one of those little social development topics most people just don’t think of – where to the City’s homeless, and those living in run-down decrepit SROs, go to get a drink of water? The City has few operating fountains in the summer, and even fewer in the winter. Public washroom facilities are few and far between. Vancouver City Councillor Andrea Reimer raises the point that the City has purposely removed these types of things to discourage drug use… how’s that working out?

The main morning feature was “Tapped” – about the bottled water industry. A topic I have mentioned here in the past. If I was to review the movie (um… which I guess I am doing), it was about 20% new and quite interesting information (in the States, the bottled water industry is regulated by the FDA, unless the water is bottled in the same state it is consumed. Since most of it is filtered city water sold locally, more than 80% of the bottled water industry is completely unregulated), 60% was info well known to anyone who has been awake for the last decade (billions of discarded PET bottles are mucking up marine ecosystems around the entire Pacific Ocean; buying bottled water is a ridiculous consumer choice, 2000x the cost of safer tap water), and 20% is unfortunate hyperbole (PET is made using a substance in the same family as benzene, which causes cancer! well, if the same family you mean aromatic hydrocarbons, you are right, but PET does not cause cancer, and no-one seems to be concerned about all the benzene we are consuming every day breathing car exhaust).

In the end, the message was on track, and if they drifted occasionally into hyperbole, it may be a cause for people to do their own research. Like most exposes of Corporate America, the best moments were the “caught-ya” moments when the corporate spokesflak realizes he is in over his head when says something like “There has never been a bottled water recall in America”, or “We are not in competition with tap water”, then are confronted with their own press releases that say the exact opposite. The lingering camera on the silenced spokesflak is always good for a chuckle.

I think the movie “65_redroses” is well known to most New West folks. Although I was familiar with Eva Markvoort’s story, I had never seen the movie. If you have not seen it, you should, mostly because the filmmakers did an excellent job accentuating the positive side of organ donation and how this young woman gained her life back through science, through good luck, and through the immense support she received from friends, family and strangers. In the end, they do not dwell on the sadness of the end, but on the hope and happiness of the brief life Eva had.

Before 65_Redroses was a short, “Corona Station”, also about love and loss. Beyond being a humorous theme, the short is remarkably well filmed, easy to forget these are film students!

The “Vanishing of the Bees” is a very smart and insightful look at Colony Collapse Disorder, and issue impacting commercial honey bees across the world. Although the movie emphasises the strongly suspected link between systemic pesticide use and CCD, it also explores how the way we manage bees is likely the main issue, with the systemic pesticides one very large hammer in drawer full of other nasty tools. We ship bees around in the backs of trucks from mono-culture crop to mono-culture crop, even in the bellied of airliners from Australia to California, completely messing with their natural rhythms. We keep them in massive crowded populations, one beekeeper managing 40,000 hives, where parasites and diseases can prosper. We artificially inseminate the queens (yes, they show the not-so-romantic procedure!), then kill them off after the eggs are laid and replace then with surrogates. We take their honey and feed them refined sugars. When hives start to die off, we split them in half and introduce new queens (in cages to keep the bees from killing the interloper), potentially spreading diseases around. All this to keep a pollinating population alive for the fruit and nut industries, as the market for honey production has been eroded by cheaper imports (often containing “honey blends” with corn syrup or lactose syrup).

With all this stacked up against them, it would be more shocking if 30% of the bees weren’t dying off! Although the film starts with gloom and doom, it is clear that the scientists, policy makers (in Europe at least), and the farmers are starting to realize what the issues are, and are working towards reforming the way the beekeeping industry is managed.

On the topic of pollinators, don’t get me started on mosquitoes and larvicides.

The final film, “H2Oil” I had seen before. All I can say is that the way Canada has mis-handled the Athabasca Tar/Oil Sands is criminal, no less than an act of war against our own country. If anyone can see how a nation responsibly manages a dumb-luck oil find, look at the case of Norway. Then ask yourself, how have the Tar/Oil sands benefited you? How does the rapid expansion and export of raw bitumen and the linking of the Canadian dollar to the cost of oil help any other sector of Canada’s economy?

I was unfortunately too busy to sit in on the post-film chat with local MPs Fin Donnelly and Peter Julian. If someone out there in blogland wants to write up a quick review, please let me know!

The Doc Fest itself was seamlessly run. The NWEP basically provided volunteer time and a little logistic support (our budget could not have bought our members tickets!), but it was Andrew Murray and the ladies from the Green Ideas Network who did most of the heavy lifting. Tireless volunteer Kathleen did a bunch of fundraising, and found a wide range of sponsors, all interested in building this community – they need to be thanked, and supported!

The good news is that for a first year- they pulled it off. Everything went smoothly, the films were on time, the extra entertainment (musicians, poets, artists) were entertaining, the venue worked out great. The early report is that the fest broke even with a little bit of a profit, to be reinvested in next year’s show. The foundations have been laid, and next year will be bigger and better.