The Editor
So, after 40 years of planning and of waiting, the SkyTrain is finally here.
Are we all happy?
It definitely is a good thing to be able to travel from A to B and avoid traffic. The cost will be less than driving and finding parking in Vancouver.
All for a billion dollars. But hey, it is what it is.
The real problem — a humongous issue — is that our city councils have allowed what is called “densification” — a long new word for a short word called “greed.”
Ask yourself: Is this type of growth a good thing and what does it really do for the average Joe and Judy?
All along the elevated train line we have highrise buildings 45 to 60 storeys built or planned, each with thousands of very small million-dollar condos. These places are called homes by the developers and will have 80% of the residents owning cars.
We love our cars but how are we going to navigate through all that new traffic. The Lougheed is called a highway but it has traffic lights unlike Route 1. So perhaps it should be called a boulevard.
Just try driving around Brentwood and you will get the feel of what we will expect soon in our town. You have to ask yourself where, are the professional planners, particularly the traffic planners? Do all the good ones work for developers? Perhaps we are just left with the ones that designed the infamous Como Lake Village parking. It seems that it is just that easy to get high rise zoning.
Brian Robinson
Coquitlam
