Preliminary results from a study by SFU transportation expert Stephan Nieweler show the North Shore is more than ready for a light rapid transit line and a fixed link over Burrard Inlet. This is especially so when compared with some other multibillion-dollar rail projects already approved or under consideration in Vancouver and Surrey.
We expect there will be a lot of North Shore folks fed up with bridge-clogging commuters enthused to learn this. We certainly are dazzled by the thought of getting from West Van to the Millennium Line in 30 minutes.
But a note to our future mayors and council members: Marching into a mayors’ council meeting and playing the tough guy likely isn’t going to get this train running on time. It takes years of study just to get a project like this on the table. Then it’s subject to political horse-trading with the other mayors of the region, all of whom are fighting for their own communities’ needs. And of course there’s still the fraught matter of how to pay for big-ticket items. It took 20 years for the Evergreen Line to go from concept to all-aboard.
Still, we want to see all our elected representatives – current and future – explore this concept in the detail it deserves and do it with a sense of urgency.
We’re always told new roads, wider bridges or a third crossing to downtown would only become clogged up again with new drivers because “if you build it, they will come.” We’d like to see if the same applies to mass transit.
Nieweler’s vision and methodology are open for debate but one thing he has said is certain. We don’t have two decades to figure out our transportation fix. We’re already stuck and getting nowhere fast.
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