Dear Editor:
Lately a lot has been written about the traffic congestion which will be created when all those new towers have been built. There seems to be an easy solution. Build at least half of them without any parking facilities. They may be snapped up by people who no longer need a car. I read several articles about how easy it is to join car sharing, car pooling and ride sharing groups while cellphones make it so easy to book. By eliminating parking facilities, the units will also be more affordable, which everybody is aiming at. Only moderate improvements will be required in the bus service to handle the additional traffic.
Many younger people now bike to work and when you follow the rules it is quite safe. From 1971 until I retired in 1995 I biked on average three times a week from Westlynn to downtown Vancouver. Now that my wife and I are in our 80s we have electric bikes and do most of our shopping by bike. With our weakened legs, the centre is too far away to walk (1.8 km), like some neighbours do. With some pedalling, the electric bike gets us there in seven minutes. People ask us how much it costs, how long it takes to charge and how far can you go on a charge. I hope we have convinced some of them that you don't have to give up biking because your legs are getting weak.
I am an environmentalist, have read a lot about pipelines and climate change, as you can see on my blog neilwilhees. Biking instead of driving a car does help the environment but without a global carbon tax, the demand for fossil fuel will keep rising. In B.C. the carbon tax has reduced the use of petroleum products by 17 per cent without loss of GDP, while it rose by a half per cent in the rest of the country. While Washington and Oregon are adapting the B.C. system as part of the Pacific Coast Collaborative for 53 million people, a lot more has to be done to come to a global agreement. That agreement will ensure that the proceeds from the tax are properly distributed, allowing all to buy the higher priced goods resulting from the rising energy cost.
Neil Heesterman
North Vancouver
