More Issues on Traffic

Saanich Snarl worse than crawl, mayor says

With multiple municipalities, it seems necessary for Mayor’s to deflect critical terms from their area to others, hence the Colwood Mayor referring to the "Saanich Snarl" instead of the “Colwood Crawl”. This of course is an entire waste of dialoged, as the people know that the traffic slow down starts at least at the hospital and affects mainly those going to Colwood/Langford. Trying to change the name of the problem is plain silly.

This came to light while Colwood council, one of the 13 municipalities was considering the proposed Victoria Regional Rapid Transit Project route.

In that review they support, a rapid-transit line to Colwood Corners rather than down Wale Road to Langford. Now we will have to see what Langford says. They might be right of course. It may also be appropriate to consider these meetings as “community input” which is certainly required. Would it not be better though to have community input, but have the final decision placed upon one elected body for the region? Right now that will never happen.

On a related note, Colwood council does not seem to support Victoria's request to the CRD for gas-tax funds to offset the rail component cost of the Johnson Street Bridge replacement project. Colwood Coun. Brian Tucknott is quoted as saying: "The rail does not come anywhere near Colwood. Very few of our citizens would use it”. This is such an insular, unhelpful and narrow view of life in our city. No wonder little gets done in an effective way. Few citizens of Victoria will use the rail at all. They all live close to downtown. Yet they will clearly pay. If a rail line has benefits for the overall community, we should all pay. If it does not, then we should not build it. Whatever the decision, it would be best made by a city council representing all of us and our interests in a way that could reasonably debate the issue and vote on it.

Interestingly, Langford Coun. Lanny Seaton is quoted as saying: "This is a rare opportunity for Langford to support Victoria.” How sad that it is considered rare, for one neighbor (or perhaps the better analogy is, resident in the same house) to support the other.