What now for the Pattullo Bridge?

The Pattullo Bridge needs replacing. Built 80 years ago but designed to last 50 years, it desperately needs replacing. River scour is causing foundation issues. The reinforcing steel is corroding. The concrete is degrading. The lanes are narrow and dangerous. It needs to go.

TransLink has a plan for replacing it, with a new bridge planned to open in 2023. In 2014 New Westminster city council did a road tour around to other councils in Metro Vancouver to push for a four-lane tolled bridge — at the time Surrey wanted a six-lane bridge. Surrey agreed that a four-lane bridge would do, as long as it could be easily expanded to six lanes should vehicular traffic volumes dictate it.

In 2016 Surrey, New Westminster, and TransLink agreed that the new Pattullo would be tolled. This is important, as the toll would help to shape traffic patterns (along with the tolls on the Golden Ears and Port Mann bridges, and on the future Massey Tunnel replacement bridge) and, more importantly, pay off roughly half of the cost of building the bridge.

And then a couple of days ago the BC Liberals said they’d cap bridge tolls at $500 per year. The BC NDP one-upped them, saying they would completely eliminate tolls.

So what does this mean for the Pattullo Bridge replacement? All of a sudden TransLink has lost about $500 million in toll revenue that they were planning on using to pay off their portion of the construction of the Pattullo Bridge replacement. Where does that money come from? The bridge needs to be replaced, that can’t be put off. But an organization with an operations budget of around $1.6 billion can’t magically pull $500 million out of a hat. Do they have to cut operational funding, which means cuts in service? Do they cut other capital projects they were planning, like the Surrey LRT or the Broadway SkyTrain line? Do they raise fares?

All of a sudden the two largest political parties in BC have thrown this planning into disarray. They’ve shown that not only are they willing to ignore the Mayors Council and TransLink, who have worked hard over the past five years to come up with plans to improve transportation in Metro Vancouver despite a hostile provincial government, they’re also willing to ignore decades of studies in transportation planning that show that congestion charges or mobility pricing, when instituted in conjunction with increases in public transit funding and availability, are the best way to fight congestion. Instead they’ve both gone with populist policies that will only serve to get them elected, and will set the region backwards five to ten years.

The BC Liberals and the BC NDP need to tell New Westminster and Surrey how the new Pattullo Bridge will be paid for, and they need to tell us before we all vote on May 9.

A Stab In The Back

Metro Vancouver has a traffic problem. A year and a half ago we had a referendum that’d put more money into fixing congestion, but it got shot down in a ball of flames. Nonetheless, the region’s mayors pushed on with their ten-year plan to do what they can to improve transportation in Metro Vancouver.

And one of the longer-term components in both funding their plan and actually reducing congestion is mobility pricing.

Use mobility pricing to reduce congestion and overcrowding, improve fairness, and generate revenue for new transportation investment

Currently there are tolls on two bridges in Metro Vancouver: the Golden Ears Bridge (operated by TransLink) and the Port Mann Bridge (operated by the Ministry of Transportation and Infrastructure). This has led to complaints, mostly from people living south of the Fraser River, that they’re unfair. They’ve also led to increased traffic over the free bridges, mostly the Pattullo Bridge between Surrey and New Westminster.

Both the Pattullo Bridge and Massey Tunnel are slated for replacement with tolled bridges, leaving just one crossing of the Fraser toll-free: the Alex Fraser Bridge. This would lead to even worse congestion on the Alex Fraser, and this is why the Mayors’ Council has been pushing for a region-wide mobility pricing scheme. It might not be tolls on every bridge, but it could be some other kind of “pay as you drive” system. Tolling bridges is easier to set up, as it uses infrastructure that’s largely already in place.

So imagine the outroar when the BC Liberals announced that, if they get re-elected in the upcoming provincial election, they would cap tolls at $500 per year. It’s an announcement that reeks of pandering for votes. It’s completely at odds with any sort of region-wide tolling plans the mayors come up with. It’s also expensive, as both bridges are losing money as it is, and now the BC Liberals are suggesting to throw even more money at them. All in the name of getting elected.

And if you were a mayor in Metro Vancouver (except for maybe Lois Jackson) you’d probably be pissed right off at the BC Liberals, who have fought against the mayors at nearly every step in their plan to make transportation in Metro Vancouver a little better. And this plan to cap tolls is at complete odds with the regional transportation plan they’ve been working hard to develop and promote.

So how can you imagine they feel after the BC NDP came out and said they’d scrap tolls entirely?

After all, the BC NDP said that they’d “put the mayors of Metro Vancouver’s transportation framework into action“. He also said “I want to make it absolutely clear to mayors and councils in all corners of B.C. that I will be on their side and not picking fights,” and “the Metro mayors have worked hard to develop a 10-year transportation plan, and New Democrats support their vision.”

Imagine you’re New Westminster mayor Jonathan Cote, a big supporter of the NDP and a proponent of mobility pricing.

Imagine you’re Metro Vancouver chair and Port Coquitlam mayor Greg Moore, who’s been pushing to get something in place by 2022, when the replacements for the Pattullo and Massey are expected to be completed, and has said, “we said mobility pricing, dynamic mobility pricing around the region is the way to go. One version of mobility pricing is tolling all of the various bridges.”

Imagine you’re Vancouver mayor Gregor Robertson who said, “We want to see a very clear step to ensure we’re on track to implementing mobility pricing.”

And imagine you’re a mayor and both the BC Liberals and the BC NDP have scuppered your plans for tolling all of the bridges. And suppose the mayors come up with a plan for mobility pricing that doesn’t involve tolling bridges, so it fits the letter of what those two parties came up with but not the spirit. “BUT THEY SAID NO MORE TOLLS” cry the drivers. And the mayors now become former mayors. Mobility pricing is now off the table, politically.

How would you feel? Stabbed in the back?

ACTBiPed Meeting Report for March 8, 2017

Another month, another ACTBiPed meeting. At March 8’s meeting we got to talk about pedestrians and accessibility, bus shelters, cycling, and a neighbourhood transportation plan. Let’s go!

First up was a report from a city planner about a pedestrian and cycling overpass at Sixth Street over Front Street and the train tracks to connect with Pier Park. This doesn’t seem to be a critical piece of infrastructure to put in right now, but the construction at 660 Quayside Drive is going to close the entrance to Pier Park along the waterfront, leaving the only access at the 4th Street elevator and stairs. City staff were asking for comments from ACTBiPed on whether this overpass should include an elevator or be an accessible ramp. Overwhelmingly the response was an accessible ramp. I think (and with good reason) people in New Westminster are hesitant to recommend outdoor elevators, and an accessible ramp means people with mobility issues (or cyclists) can get to and from Pier Park at any time. Look for this overpass to be in place hopefully before construction at 660 Quayside starts in Spring 2018.

Next came a report and update on New Westminster’s Bus Shelter program. New West has a goal to have shelters at 75% of feasible bus stop locations by 2020. A bus stop is considered “feasible” if there’s enough room — a shelter needs a 1.5m x 4.5m concrete pad, and that has to be a minimum of 1.3m from the curb. To hit the target, New West needs to have an additional 35 shelters put in place. Now, Pattison Outdoor Advertising has a contract with the city to install, operate, maintain, and repair bus shelters with advertising, but they want to put shelters in locations that are feasible for them — high traffic areas. (Side note: the city gets back a percentage of the ad revenue, about $100/month/shelter!) The city has compiled a list of feasible high priority locations based on ridership numbers and demographics, and of this list 7 are also on Pattison’s “good advertising potential” list. I don’t know where those are, but they’ll be going in in 2017. Additionally, Ewen Avenue is going to get a “public art inspired” bus shelter. If you’re into designing bus shelters, check out the call for artists. Another non-ad shelter is going to go in somewhere on Quayside Drive. (Mad props to Max Leung, a co-op student, who crunched all the numbers that went into the report and answered the questions we threw at him!)

If you have suggestions on where bus shelters might be needed, please do let the city know! Also, if you have any suggestions on providing shelter at the Police Station stop on Sixth Street, let the city know as well!

After the bus shelter report came a report about the ‘listen and learn’ workshop held in Sapperton as one of the initial stages for the development of the Sapperton Transportation Plan.  Given the report was largely based on input from the community, there were some… interesting ideas that won’t actually see the light of day (like the Stormont Connector). The report gave good insight into what Sapperton residents see as important in their neighbourhood. From a cycling point-of-view, the gap in the Central Valley Greenway between Cumberland and Brunette was noted as a huge deficiency, and there’s also some talk towards making Keary Street the official bike route between Columbia and Richmond instead of Sherbrooke Street.

Days are still early, so if you have any interest in transportation in Sapperton (and most importantly, pedestrian transportation) definitely follow the city’s news. The next workshop is scheduled for April 8, 2017.

We then got an update on the public consultation for the Rotary Crosstown Greenway improvements. About a dozen people showed up, and the response was largely positive. Some people thought that the plans don’t go far enough and the bike lanes should be properly separated with curbs! Look for paint to go down on the street sometime this summer. It’ll be New Westminster’s first AAA (all ages and abilities) walking and cycling path!

And to finish things off, Mary Wilson announced the Walk New West Challenge that’s happening from April 3 to May 28. Form a team, register, and discover just how walkable New Westminster is!

ACTBiPed Meeting Report for February 15, 2017

I’m a member of New Westminster’s Advisory Committee for Transit, Bicycles and Pedestrians (aka ACTBiPed), and we had our first meeting of the year on February 2017. Since they’re open to the public and only one member of the public routinely attends (the always awesome Mary Wilson), I’ve decided to post a little report after each meeting outlining the things that we do and learn in these meetings to help shed some light on the City’s efforts to make sustainable modes of transportation safer and more appealing.

Because last night was the first one of the year, we had to deal with the administrivia first: Oath of Office, don’t be a jerk, that sort of thing. Did you know that as a member of an advisory committee I’m not allowed to take bribes? Shocking, I know!

The first proper committee work we did was to receive and endorse the 2017 ACTBiPed Transportation Work Plan, which gives a summary of the things that the Transportation Section of the City is planning on bringing to the committee in 2017 for our consideration. Our work is largely guided by the City’s Master Transportation Plan, which has the following four targets to achieve before 2041:

  1. Increase sustainable transportation such that the proportion of trips by sustainable modes will be 40% by 2021, 50% by 2031, and 60% by 2041;
  2. No additional increase in regional through traffic;
  3. Reduce distance driving from 10km per person per day to 6.5km per person per day;
  4. Increase safety so that there will be no traffic-related fatalities or serious injuries most years.

Since we’re concerned with sustainable modes of transportation (transit, cycling, and walking) a lot of what the city is planning to hit targets 1, 3 and 4 fall under ACTBiPed’s remit. In 2017, some of the areas they’re planning on bringing to us include:

We endorsed this work plan, and I’m looking forward to seeing more details on a number of these items.

We then received a report from Engineering Services about the 2017 Pedestrian Crossing Improvement Program. The first thing to note about this is that the budget of $250,000 for this program has not yet been approved by council, so it’s subject to change.

Engineering Services has identified 9 locations in the city that would benefit from some sort of improvements to make crossing the street safer for pedestrians. The procedure to identify these locations is a little complicated, involving vehicle traffic counts, pedestrian traffic counts, vehicle speeds, distance from another control device, number of collisions, and the demographics of pedestrians in the area (is it on a Safe Route to School, are there a significant number of vulnerable pedestrians such as seniors or people with disabilities, and so on). They also use these statistics to determine what kind of improvements are warranted — it makes no sense to put a pedestrian activated traffic signal on a quiet street with very few pedestrians.

Punching in all of the numbers and doing some analysis, Engineering Services came up with these proposed improvements:

There are another two that Engineering Services hopes to improve in 2018:

Judging from the discussion around the table, the last one is going to be a little controversial. It’s fairly close to the pedestrian crossing at Royal Avenue and Stewardson Way, and there isn’t a lot of pedestrian traffic at Royal and Eleventh. It has a lot of vehicle traffic, and that vehicle traffic is moving quickly (67.5km/h in a 50km/h zone). But importantly, of all the crossings analyzed this crossing had the second-highest number of collisions, and even worse, it had a pedestrian collision. Pedestrians surveyed say they do not feel safe at the Royal/Stewardson crossing, and this crossing would make pedestrians feel and be safer crossing Royal at Eleventh.

We endorsed the 2017 Pedestrian Crossing Improvement Program, and since that was the last item on the agenda, we wrapped up the meeting.

New Westminster’s business community wants more affordable housing

At the January 16, 2017 New Westminster Council Meeting, Mustel Group (a market research consulting company) presented the results of a survey that they had done of New West’s business community during September and October 2016. You can read the full survey results in the agenda package I linked to above, but I would like to highlight some important pieces of data.

First, in the quantitative section (this is where they just look at survey question responses and not free-form answers), the factor influencing a local business’s location that had the worst satisfaction rating was local affordable housing. In other words, current businesses are not satisfied with the availability of affordable housing here.

Second, affordable housing was the fourth-highest priority that local businesses wanted to see improved in New West, after being more business friendly, transportation, and taxes.

In the qualitative section, where an interviewer sat down with business owners and representatives to get more detailed and personal responses, the lack of affordable housing was seen as one of the challenges of doing business in the city. Related to this was the concern of the lack of mixed-use developments, which the business community feels contribute to a thriving city.

One of the suggestions that came out of the qualitative section was to “develop the business community — but keep green space and affordable housing in mind to make New Westminster a more livable city.”

And one of the questions that was asked was “what would you do if you could make one change?” One of the responses was “creating more affordable housing and student housing which will contribute to the overall growth and development of the city; and help to create a balanced city in which it would be comfortable to work and live.”

It’s pretty clear that the New Westminster business community wants more affordable housing in New Westminster. It only makes sense.

People shop more and use more services close to where they live. If people can’t afford to live in New West, they’re usually not going to make special trips to go grocery shopping in New West. They’ll come for specialty items like wedding dresses (which has a good knock-on affect for local businesses like restaurants) but most businesses rely on a relatively steady stream of local customers. They can’t all rely on tourists to our city.

If people can’t afford to live in New Westminster, then they’ll have to commute in to their jobs in New Westminster. This either increases the amount of traffic on the roads (which was the business community’s biggest challenge of doing business here) or if they rely on transit, they’ll miss shifts because of transit delays or be unable to make early morning shifts on weekends because of cutbacks to TransLink schedules. In either case commuters need to spend more money and time to get to their jobs, money and time that could be spent shopping locally.

And not only that, if a family is mortgaged up to their eyeballs, they don’t have any extra money to spend on a night out for dinner, or shop locally for gifts for loved ones, or buy a new bike from the local bike store, or meet up with friends at the local brewery. All of these businesses (and more!) take hits from housing being too expensive.

Not every job is going to pay a living wage, unfortunately. As a recap from a Kelowna Chamber of Commerce discussion on ending homelessness and supporting affordable housing put it:

The reality of the labour market is that some people make lower wages than others, yet are critical to our labour pool. These workers and community residents need affordable housing, and need it in order to work, to continue to contribute to the economy, and to avoid the risk of becoming homeless.

Without local affordable housing we run the risk of requiring people to pay more for transportation to get to their jobs, which means they have to cut from other parts of their budget. Without local affordable housing we run the risk of people holding too much debt, which doesn’t allow them to support local businesses. And without affordable housing we run the risk of losing these local businesses entirely.

The New Westminster business community sees this, and they rightly want more affordable housing in New Westminster.