The Editor,
Re. "Advocates push an extra 0.5% TransLink sales tax" (The Tri-City News, Aug. 28).
The notion that a regional 0.5% sales tax increase will solve TransLink's financial ills is naive in the extreme. Spending more money on unsustainable transit projects will only exacerbate TransLink's money woes.
It was first thought the driverless SkyTrain would bring cheaper transit to the region; instead, it now burdens the taxpayer with a 40% to 60% operating penalty over much cheaper light-rail transit (LRT). But TransLink blunders on, planning more such lines, and even when forced to plan for LRT, as in Surrey, it designs it as a poor man's SkyTrain, both hugely expensive and unworkable.
Despite the more than $9 billion invested in SkyTrain, there is no evidence that it has reduced congestion or gridlock, and new studies show that TransLink's current SkyTrain planning is actually increasing congestion and pollution.
"User-friendly" and "affordable" are just not in the lexicon of the current TransLink management.
Malcolm Johnston, Delta
