Pull your bicycles to the side of the lane. Pardon me as I drag my knuckles for a moment.
For this is a column about the car. You know, that relic enemy in the city’s deliberate and divisive transit political strategy that made possible my sarcastic opening paragraph.
Let’s first detour for a bit of context, just so you know where I stand, albeit with knuckles to the ground: we need more public transit. It cannot arrive quickly enough and – thanks to dithering and fumbling by municipal and provincial leaders – it will not arrive quickly enough. We would need to elect both governments twice again before a substantial transit project ribbon-cutting.
Never mind, the city moves to tear down viaducts, slenderize the Burrard Bridge, add bike lanes and erect tower after tower.
Fine, if we were approaching public transit nirvana, if something were happening. Nothing has, nothing is.
Plan A fell prey to a plebiscite. Plan B? Politicians have been scampering to Paris to talk climate change – all the while, months later, no change in a climate of political inertia. Mayors lose sleep on jet lag, not on this failure.
Given we have lost a half-decade to an idea at least a decade away, the longer I look at plans for a Broadway subway, the less I like them. There are surely faster, cheaper and better ways to (among other things) add routes, so double-articulated buses on dedicated lanes (perhaps counter-flowed) and co-ordinated traffic lights get people across town in the rush. Surely, too, there are shrewd surface transit projects that could be launched in short order in our neighbourhoods to ease people out of their cars willingly.
Of course, then again, let’s not forget, city hall loves to annoy drivers and deceive the ideologues.
To wit: the heel-fortified residents of Point Grey Road and environs have a gated community posing as a bike route. I was there last week to get some time to myself. Even the burglars are lonely.
No doubt the city could have built a mixed-use road with one-way traffic – east or west, wouldn’t much matter – and protected cycling lanes that would be envied and not invidious. But, no, wiseacres at 12th and Cambie had to choose: satisfy donors or satisfy drivers.
Let’s be clear: Point Grey Road, the viaduct decision and subway plan are much more about rewarding supporters than rewarding the environment, only a green concept if our currency were still that colour.
But our community obligation in the absence of imminently thorough public transit is to a) help traffic flow effectively, and b) help people leave vehicles genuinely.
Nothing the city has done recently even nudges us in this direction. The motorist is essentially the new smoker – taxed as a sinner would be, eyed as a major revenue stream. Cars and trucks are treated as the economic drain and not the economic spine. The city’s transportation culture is terrible.
Our decision four decades ago to reject a freeway was a great call, but we need not endure solvable bottlenecks of idling and emitting. This is too small a city to not get handily from here to there.
There is an environmental value, too, in an investment in technology to recognize traffic patterns, experiment with dedicated lanes with counter-flow and extended green lights, or substantially restrict arterial parking.
But it’s becoming clear we need a more frugal, speedily delivered transit project timetable, a practical scheme to finance it and an end to provincial-municipal bickering about it.
Don’t make a choice: Fix the traffic flow as you extend the cycling infrastructure. Choose to get the job done for all modes of transportation. Yesterday.
I am no different than anyone in wanting our city to be a green leader. But one sure route that won’t get us there is to sustain the war on the car or strive to make mortal enemies of motorists and cyclists.
We need, instead, leadership on a more seductive peace plan. Remember, sunny ways.
Kirk LaPointe is Business in Vancouver’s vice-president of audience and business development.
