Vancouver Transit Referendum

[Blob Mckenzie]

Nahhhh we got the boot from the Astoria a couple weeks back . The dude was all coked up and grabbed one of the bouncers . We will have to hit the American instead .

[5thhorseman]

Just like Poco, there`s a lot more to Langley than just the downtown exchange or Willowbrook Mall. I sure will never use any LRT to Langley. It's nowhere close to me. I`m happy blasting down Hwy #1 from the far reaches of Langley all the way to Burnaby/Vancouver in 40 minutes. Port Mann is effin great! don't know what Arachnid is talking about.

[dangler]

Main street station= 1 block stumble to the American.

I didn't know the Astoria had Transgendered bouncers

[Blob Mckenzie]

Main street station= 1 block stumble to the American.

I didn't know the Astoria had Transgendered bouncers

No this was a guy he shoved . He was pissed off because the guy was moving in on his tranny .

[dangler]

Just like Poco, there`s a lot more to Langley than just the downtown exchange or Willowbrook Mall. I sure will never use any LRT to Langley. It's nowhere close to me. I`m happy blasting down Hwy #1 from the far reaches of Langley all the way to Burnaby/Vancouver in 40 minutes. Port Mann is effin great! don't know what Arachnid is talking about.

Subway Connections to the core areas of PoCo & Langley will be a huge step up from the existing options.

Port Mann is effin great,but they have to toll and rebuild the Pattulo to return bridge use proportions to pre-toll levels, and shelling out huge interest on borrowed cash to pay for necessary transit infrastructure sucks balls ###

[BurningBeard]

First, let's be honest, the proposed LRT is primarily in Surrey, not Langley. Great for Surrey, I have no issue with that, but Langley City is going to get less then 5 KM of LRT track and Langley Township is going to get sweet fuck all.

For the amount Langley residents pay, they should have had a B-Line service down 200th 5 years ago. Don't even get me started about the horrific service in Aldergrove. If I was a small business owner in that area I would be loosing my mind over this.

I'm all for funding transit in general, but when Langley is getting forced to abide by density requirements laid out by Metro Vancouver without getting the Transit to support said density, they're getting doubly screwed. I use transit almost every day in Langley, and I used to live in Vancouver - I know it's horrible, it's not even comparable.

[Topper]

One thing about living in the outer areas that will receive fuck all transit is you're not far from the regional district boundary to shop elsewhere. A sales tax is easier for you to avoid than a property tax would be.

[KeyserSoze]

Compass Card fuckups

You know your fare system is extremely fucked up when a 5 min (1 stop) bus ride from Denman/Georgia across the lions gate bridge to Park Royal costs the same cost as a 1.5+ hour bus-skytrain-seabus-bus trip from New West to North/West Van.

[Arachnid]

Just like Poco, there`s a lot more to Langley than just the downtown exchange or Willowbrook Mall. I sure will never use any LRT to Langley. It's nowhere close to me. I`m happy blasting down Hwy #1 from the far reaches of Langley all the way to Burnaby/Vancouver in 40 minutes. Port Mann is effin great! don't know what Arachnid is talking about.

You will in 10 years

[ukcanuck]

Do what Dubai does, set up cameras all over the place and nail speeders with hefty fines.

The speed limit varies from 60 to 120 and they give you a 20 k grace which makes it damn near impossible to know exactly what speed one should be going at any particular time. Those cameras are flashing like Christmas trees.

They also have tolls on every road in and out of the downtown core

But hey it's tax free here !

[5thhorseman]

Port Mann is effin great,but they have to toll and rebuild the Pattulo to return bridge use proportions to pre-toll levels, and shelling out huge interest on borrowed cash to pay for necessary transit infrastructure sucks balls ###

The right way to do this would have been to toll all the bridges and tunnels so that it's more closely aligned with the users that would benefit, but no-one's got the political balls for that.

Just like Poco, there`s a lot more to Langley than just the downtown exchange or Willowbrook Mall. I sure will never use any LRT to Langley. It's nowhere close to me. I`m happy blasting down Hwy #1 from the far reaches of Langley all the way to Burnaby/Vancouver in 40 minutes. Port Mann is effin great! don't know what Arachnid is talking about.

You will in 10 years

Yeah probably, but an LRT to Willowbrook is not going to do much to relieve Hwy #1 traffic. It's not even a drop in the bucket. You take a look at what commuters have in the UK and you understand what it takes. People are moving to Langley in droves as housing is so much more affordable, and to continue to commute to Burnaby/Vancouver we're gonna need trains and express services, not some LRT that takes forever to get there.

[BurningBeard]

Port Mann is effin great,but they have to toll and rebuild the Pattulo to return bridge use proportions to pre-toll levels, and shelling out huge interest on borrowed cash to pay for necessary transit infrastructure sucks balls ###

The right way to do this would have been to toll all the bridges and tunnels so that it's more closely aligned with the users that would benefit, but no-one's got the political balls for that.

The right way to do it would have been to get rid of all the tolls and apply a road tax to the entire Metro Vancouver area. Why should someone who commutes from North Surrey to Coquitlam everyday, or Langley to Maple Ridge, have to pay more than someone who commutes from Richmond to Downtown Vancouver? Who is creating the largest congestion problem by being a car on the road in those three scenarios?

[5thhorseman]

Those three journeys you mention all cross bridges, so they would pay equally (say $1 per bridge crossing). This is fair because bridges are by far the most expensive part of the infrastructure.

A road tax might approach the same level of fairness if it were levied based on miles driven in Metro Vancouver, but how would you measure that? Otherwise, if it's a flat fee or something similar then those travelling 50 km each way like I do would pay the same as those travelling just a few blocks!

[Aaronp18]

The right way to do it would have been to get rid of all the tolls and apply a road tax to the entire Metro Vancouver area. Why should someone who commutes from North Surrey to Coquitlam everyday, or Langley to Maple Ridge, have to pay more than someone who commutes from Richmond to Downtown Vancouver? Who is creating the largest congestion problem by being a car on the road in those three scenarios?

Why should someone who uses transit or only commutes locally be charged a tax to subsidize building more or upgraded crossings?

I agree with horseman, toll all the crossings a moderate fee. Makes things far more palatable and I'd be willing to pay that minor fee when I use the bridges and tunnels.

[BurningBeard]

The right way to do it would have been to get rid of all the tolls and apply a road tax to the entire Metro Vancouver area. Why should someone who commutes from North Surrey to Coquitlam everyday, or Langley to Maple Ridge, have to pay more than someone who commutes from Richmond to Downtown Vancouver? Who is creating the largest congestion problem by being a car on the road in those three scenarios?

Why should someone who uses transit or only commutes locally be charged a tax to subsidize building more or upgraded crossings?

I agree with horseman, toll all the crossings a moderate fee. Makes things far more palatable and I'd be willing to pay that minor fee when I use the bridges and tunnels.

Currently you're not tolled going from Richmond to Vancouver, and I'm not saying that wouldn't be a step in the right direction. Going further and simply tolling based on flat road usage seems "more fair" to me though. A flat road usage tax gets rid of the problem all together. It also makes it easier to create incentives around certain driving patterns. It creates the incentive that, no matter where you are, you want to use the road as little as possible.

Even if you use transit or only commute locally you're still using the infrastructure, and you're paying for it right now anyways through gas and property taxes. You can make the argument that the gas tax has that same affect as a road usage tax, but it's not really true. The primary purpose of a gas tax should be to get people to use less gas, and buy more fuel efficient vehicles, not fund infrastructure (although that can be a nice side benefit). All I'm suggesting is flat road usage is the "most fair" way to go about doing it.