The Editor:
Re: The "Unliveable Strategic Regional Plan"
Does anyone actually believe that a skyscraper is a healthy home for children?
The social and physical health of our youth is being harmed by isolation and lack of contact with nature.
Studies show that the children do not go out to play on their own until they are 10 years old.
Some European cities do not allow skyscrapers for family living.
Under the guise of providing affordable housing, we are creating dead zones for children to grow up in.
These developments are mostly devoid of trees and playgrounds, with increased traffic and greater pollution.
The urban renewal of the 1960s turned out to be a social disaster and was condemned by the famous writer and activist, Jane Jacobs.
Are we going the same way with densification, creating sterile enclaves and expecting children to develop normally?
Twenty per cent of B.C. households have children. Coquitlam is demolishing trees and sound, affordable low-rise condos to build skyscrapers are going up in a core area that will be a polluted heat island of concrete, steel and glass.
Councils are following the “Unliveable Strategic Regional Plan” by taking down trees with little thought for the threats of global warming or the affects on the development of our youth.
We don’t seem to have learned from the planning mistakes of the past.
- Yvonne Harris, Coquitlam
