The provincial government appears hell-bent on proceeding with the proposed $3.5-billion, 10-lane toll bridge to replace the existing, often-congested Massey Tunnel. This project is quite understandable to the many commuters who must use the tunnel every day to get to and from work, and spend enormous amounts of time sitting in traffic jams. Massey Tunnel…
Category: Vancouver
Climate change — it’s everywhere
Today I think I finally connected the dots. Up till now, I hadn’t fully grasped just how many day-to-day reorderings are directly related to global warming. Not just the extreme weather events that become headlines but, perhaps even more importantly, so many smaller, local changes are directly related to the climate crisis. Scientists now report…
Stopping “free” trade or starting racism?
Is Britain’s decision to exit the EU good news or bad for progressives in Canada and the rest of the world? Those of us on the left have long opposed so-called free trade agreements. We fought the good fight against Brian Mulroney’s NAFTA and we are opposed, with good reason, to the Trans-Pacific Partnership currently…
As TransLink turns a page
Those of you familiar with the HandyDART file will be aware of the fact that a few years ago TransLink awarded this very important contract to a for-profit, privately owned American company based in Dallas, Texas. Users and workers have been complaining about the quality of service ever since. A group I’m with, the HandyDART…
Empty homeless promises now painfully true
Tuesday the numbers from the annual homeless count were released. The headlines say it all: “Record number of homeless on Vancouver streets“. For those of us who genuinely believe there is absolutely no excuse for homelessness in any society, let alone a society as rich as ours, the numbers were not just bad, they were…
Vision-run public hearings: From bad to worse
Tuesday night the City of Vancouver held a Public Hearing on a controversial rezoning application for a Cressey development at East 18th and Commercial Drive in the Cedar Cottage area. Many citizens took time out of their busy schedules to attend the Public Hearing, which was chaired by Raymond Louie, one of Vision Vancouver’s councillors….
City Hall’s secret cash machine
Did you know that our Vision-Vancouver-dominated City Council has a Bid Committee that operates in secret? Council gave it authority to award contracts of any size without going out to tender whenever Council is on summer break. The Bid Committee — composed of City Hall bureaucrats (namely the city manager, director of finance, and voting department heads) — can also award contracts of up to $2 million in value at any time. That added up to 39 contracts…