The Editor,
Re. “Road through park old way of thinking” (Letters, The Tri-City News, Aug. 17).
I support the “expressway” through Bert Flinn Park and, as an loco Road resident, I’ll admit I’m biased in this matter. But the letter writer, Rob Collins, mentions there are five alternatives listed at savebertflinnpark.ca so I was intrigued as to what they could be. After reading them, I was disappointed.
There is essentially only one alternative offered, for Anmore to force the developer Brilliant Circle Group (BCG) to build a new connector to Strong Road. The other four options are contingent on another connector being built. So it’s really just a decision between a Strong Road or Bert Flinn connector being built. The rest of the rhetoric on the website is either contradictory or irreverent to their agenda of “saving” Bert Flinn Park.
The website says let’s save BCG millions by not building a connector but then suggests a nearly as expensive connector to Strong Road. You realize the most expensive part of the connector is building a bridge over Mossom creek and such a connection would also require a bridge over Mossom?
Not to mention the extensive destruction to the north shore wetlands to build such a road (something else the website contradicts itself about when talking about saving the wetlands)?
And then there’s Aspenwood Drive, a two-lane road that cannot handle a huge increase in traffic to connect to David and Heritage Mountain.
Many houses would have to be demolished to widen this to four lanes.
Step 5 is to traffic-calm loco Road, which I support, but is irrelevant to “saving” Bert Flinn. If loco is traffic-calmed, the bulk of the traffic must be diverted to an alternative route. I would rather see the road through Bert Flinn than to destroy more wetlands around Strong Road. And it makes far more sense since Heritage Mountain is already four lanes and building a four-lane extension to David would be able to handle all the new traffic and divert existing traffic from loco and East road. With only a two-lane connector through Aspenwood, Ioco would still have to bear the brunt of the traffic.
It is always sad to see trees cut down and wild lands destroyed but this is the inevitable reality of the suburban sprawl in any growing city.
Even if Bert Flinn is “saved,” wild lands will just be destroyed somewhere else to make way for new roads and new housing for our city’s ever-growing population.
Brendan MacDonald,
Port Moody
ENOUGH PM GROWTH
The Editor,
Having signed the petition to preserve Bert Flinn Park in its present form without building a road through it, I would like to reinforce my opposition to this high-traffic or any other road for motor vehicle traffic through the park.
Port Moody and the rest of the Tri-Cities are already suffering from overdevelopment and a deterioration of quality of life. Having been a resident of my current address in Port Moody since 1992, I can testify to that: High-traffic noise even during the night on residential streets, the pollution of Sasamat Lake and the overcrowding of its beaches, the numerous highrise condo towers and attendant traffic congestion threaten to turn this community into a suburban Manhattan. Not even the Evergreen Line, with its lack of parking spaces, will change that and is at best a catch-up provision rather than a solution.
There has to be a slowing or even a stop to this, as in some U.S. communities that have adopted a no-further-growth policy in order to preserve the quality of life for their population.
The greed for more tax revenue should not be what motivates our city council.
Helmut Wober, Port Moody
