By Pepper Parr
April 21st, 2017
BURLINGTON, ON
The room was full. It was a rainy night but under 100 people showed up for an information session on their vision for the downtown part of the city. The focus was on mobility hubs.
The Gazette will do a more in-depth report – this is a first look at the kind of questions that were asked and the answers given
There were some surprises.
A participant using the hand held device to record their answer to the question being asked.
There were 12 questions asked. The question was put up on a screen – the people in the room had been given hand held clickers that they could use to indicate their choice.
We report on two of the questions in this early look at what was an important event. There will be a follow up meeting in June for the people in Ward 2.
The intention is to hold similar session for each of the four mobility hubs that city has identified.
This is city building at its best. How it will roll out is going to be interesting to watch.
These answers are going to surprise the Bfast people and give Burlington Transit a lot to think about.
There were a number of developers in the room along with just about everyone that mattered from the Planning department. On the political side – Councillors Taylor and Meed Ward were in the room along with the Mayor who opened the session. More to follow.
So much for the argument that we need more people downtown to make the core the vibrant place everyone appears to want it to become.
I was pleasantly surprised at the response to the cycling question. 61% agreed or strongly agreed “additional or enhanced cycling infrastructure is needed in the Downtown.”
There was another question — didn’t catch the exact wording — that asked whether people wanted more options / different ways to get around by walking/cycling/transit. Overwhelming support on that one too.
Did the “build bigger roads for my car” lobby stay home from this one?
James like all cyclist advocate’s you believe the car lobby as you call it is against you. We would love to ditch our expensive cars and travel on winged horse’s if we could, but the practicalities of daily life make that somewhat difficult.
No, most cyclists’s own cars & most car owners own bikes, it seems to me that once on a bike it transforms you into some kind of arrogant lout with no regard for anyone else. I don’t know why that is. and as far as advocacy groups of any kind go, they just like being advocates it makes them feel important, they basically like bossing people around. I am glad you were pleasantly surprised that a lot of people agreed with better ways of getting around, but moving around this city better does not translate into Cyclists having no regard for anyone else. Personally I would not dream of riding a bicycle in a bike lane it looks extremely dangerous and I would not ride on the sidewalk as that would be ignorant, so whats the point of owning a bike. I’ll either walk or drive thank you.
James I’m all for building dedicated bike paths – as I think they are a great amenity for the community. However it’s not a question that gets any data. It’s like asking if people would like an extra free desert with a meal.
“Did the build bigger roads for my car lobby stay home from this one?”
I think you are missing the point – no one doesn’t depend heavily on the road system. Even if you never drive every product you eat was driven in by large trucks. It transports around building supplies and a fleet of trades people who keep our communities going.
Congesting the road system reduces productivity and steals people time. It will increase expenses for everyone. So once again. Dedicated bike lanes I think are an amenity we should have, but there is no – we should expand biking VS we should expand traffic lanes.
We should have reasonable sane plan to get people where they want to go – however they feel they need to get there. And if we can not we should not be massively expanding the population base and hoping massive traffic congestion gives way to “mass biking”. This has not worked anyplace on the globe and will not work here.
I don’t see any evidence that city staff care anything about what residents want. They have meetings and some times talk a good game, but mechanisms? Rules? Anything concrete?
Nope. The only rules and mechanisms proposed in the official plan update are just designed to encourage massive overbuilding of terrible places to live on top of a complete lack of transit planning of any kind.
They think there client is the provincial government which just wants more places to stuff more people to fill more trains headed for Toronto.
There is nothing to improve the lives of the people of Burlington proposed or planned. They are not building some sort of “multi-transit” oriented vibrant city. They are building a grey traffic congested city intentionally.
When the question was asked about transit routes, stops and frequency, had the question been asked HOW MANY PEOPLE IN THIS ROOM USE PUBLIC TRANSIT? HOW MANY PEOPLE TRAVELLED BY PUBLIC TRANSIT TO GET TO THIS MEETING.
If you don’t ask the right questions the answers received are worthless.