The Need for a Regional Transportation Authority

There is no question we need a regional approach to transportation. Transportation infrastructure seldom stops at municipal borders and most people don’t limit travel to inside their municipality. People are moving around the region and we need a regional approach to preserve their mobility.

This term, as Vice Chair of the CRD’s Planning, Transportation and Protective Services Committee, I helped initiate discussions about a Regional Transportation Authority. A staff report  then recommended we move forward.  The committee agreed and sent the report to the CRD Board with a recommendation to approve further action.

At the board level, Mayors Fortin and Leonard moved an amendment clarifying  transit’s role and the recommendation was passed. I look forward to establishment of a Regional Transportation Authority. By itself, it won’t solve our transportation concerns. But, at least we’ll be able to take a regional approach to a regional issue.

Transportation and Land Use - “The Dynamic Duo”

Recently, concerns about transportation in our region have increased dramatically and, for good reason. Traffic congestion is clearly, far greater now  than it was just 10 years ago and its going to get worse before it gets better. So, it’s good that we’re talking about light rail transit (LRT), priority bus lanes and a host of other possible solutions.

What we really need to talk about, however, is making good land use and transportation choices together. Traffic doesn’t just appear by magic. Instead, it’s the cumulative impact of all the land use decisions we make. Low density, sprawling land use is very hard to serve economically by transit and residences are often far from services and recreation. So, for most people, it’s preferable, and virtually necessary, to travel by car. The more we spread out, the worse the problem becomes.

In contrast, well designed, higher density neighbourhoods can often be well served by transit, and located close to services and recreation. These neighbourhoods , make car use far less necessary with ample opportunity to take transit, cycle or walk.

By all means, let’s talk transportation; but, remember, in this dynamic duo, land use is  Batman to transportation’s Robin.  

The Case for LRT

LRT, or light rail transit, has become a bit of a lightning rod in our region lately. There is no question that it’s expensive, but it may well be worth the expense. Going to LRT has some significant advantages:

• It is uniquely successful in attracting new riders. Since were trying to get people switched to transit, that’s a significant advantage
• It offers environmental advantages such as reduced energy use
• In the long term, it’s cheaper than alternatives such as bus rapid transit

• Most importantly, if has the ability to shape a city and put growth in the right places. LRT signals to the development community that you are a partner for the long term. In turn, they can invest with confidence and “kick start”  the development process. There are many examples, around the world, of exactly that taking place.

All of this doesn’t mean LRT at any cost to local taxpayers. Federal and provincial governments need to pay their share. That’s reasonable since, increasingly, they get their revenues from healthy cities. We also should NOT “conveniently” throw the cost onto property tax. There are more creative ways to finance a project like LRT. In Portland, with the Max line, property values went up in the range of 500%. That’s great for property owners but public investment created the new value. It’s only reasonable to recapture some of that value and pay for the investment that created it.

It’s also important to remember “the dynamic duo”. LRT could be great but it must be accompanied by clear land use agreements insuring new growth will be compact and not sprawling. Sprawl by transit is sprawl nevertheless.

Finally, there will always be those who claim LRT is too expensive. Fine, but, for our future,  just how expensive will it be to not do it?

Designing for Pedestrians and Cyclists

Look at any “government” transportation policy in our region and you will  discover that walking, cycling and transit are priority modes. Of course, try telling that to a pedestrian on a bleak sidewalk next to a major artery or to a cyclist in a narrow lane with traffic whizzing past his or her shoulder. They may not agree.

If we’re really serious about priorities, things must change. Most potential cyclists won’t ride in with traffic and pedestrians will be much less inclined to walk if infrastructure looks like it came from Soviet era Russia. For both groups, we need infrastructure that feels safe, comfortable and attractive. The  Galloping Goose is a good example and its so well used it’s almost a victim of its success. We’ll need a lot more “Galloping Goose’s” in our future.

Beyond these qualities, we need to design our communities to promote walking and cycling as options. For pedestrians in particular that means making sure there are “local destinations “ within easy walking distance.  Give someone a coffee shop a 5 minute stroll away and they’ll likely walk. Make it 30 minutes and: “lot’s of luck”. For cyclists distance isn’t quite so critical but it’s still a factor. A 5 minute ride to the mall means it really isn’t worth taking the car. Put the mall 5 kilometres away and, again, the story changes.

Walking and cycling are, environmentally friendly, good for our health and a great way to relieve congestion. It’s time we got serious about making them a priority.

The Concept of Network

It’s interesting to  hear politicians promote an interchange at Admirals Road and the Highway. Maybe they lack understanding or maybe it’s just good old politics. In any case, it ignores the concept of network.

Transportation systems are networks similar, in many ways, to your body’s circulatory system. Who amongst us would tinker by doubling blood in our main artery while leaving everything else alone. It’s called a heart attack and probable death. So, why do it with the network that happens to circulate our vehicles?  

Sure, you can get  away with a valve replacement or a bypass if the rest of your system is healthy and within capacity. However, our traffic network is at or beyond capacity across the board. At best, we’ll only move congestion around.

For our interchange example, the intent is to move traffic between the highway and McKenzie quickly with the added benefit of free flowing  passage on Admirals to McKenzie. Fine, but what’s the consequence? Drive a short way east on McKenzie and BANG; you hit the light at Burnside. Drive a bit further and there’s another at Carey, then Glanford, Saanich Road and, eventually, the “biggie” at Quadra. Just what do “interchange promoters” think will happen on Mckenzie? In case they haven’t noticed, it’s heavily congested already. Pardon me, but it shouldn’t take Einstein to see the problem.

To really improve mobility, we must understand “network” and work within it’s confines.  Major improvements should add capacity across the network, not just on a little piece of it. In all likelihood that means improvements that reduce demand on roads and give travelers other options.

I hope, as we move to our future, we will intelligently enhance our network. God help us if the “tinkerers” win the day!

Just What is TDM?

TDM is an acronym for Travel Demand Management. Essentially, it involves a comprehensive strategy to reduce demand in your network. Most strategies involve two distinct “streams”: strategies to encourage less car use and strategies to penalize those  who don’t manage to reduce.

UVic provides a classic example. Faced with increasing parking issues, the University came up with the U-Pass. Every student pays a fee as part of their registration and gets a bus pass. As a bonus, the cost of the pass is substantially subsidized by the University. There’s the incentive. You’ve got the pass -  you might as well use it. At the same time, Uvic increased parking fees. Okay, if you’re not going to use that pass, it’s going to cost you more. The result - a 10 - 20% reduction in car trips to campus even though student numbers went up . That’s TDM at its finest.

We have lot’s of opportunity to use TDM on a broader scale. You may have noticed the vast majority of commuter vehicles are “single occupancy” Just think of the gains if we could “encourage” even half of those vehicles held two people or more and, by the way, it wouldn’t cost us much to do it.

The Cost of Congestion

You might have noticed that, in one way or another, most of this webpage is about dealing with congestion and, well it should be. Congestion cost us big time.

To begin with, there’s an obvious impact on our quality of life. Time spent moving nowhere, or moving somewhere slowly is not quality time. So, increased congestion has an inverse relationship with quality of life Then there’s the impact on the environment. Increased congestion means more fuel is burned and more pollution generated to get from A to B. You do the math.

Congestion also costs our economy. If you’re running a business and it takes twice as long to get supplies or make deliveries, you have a direct economic cost. Similarly, if you’ve got a restaurant and it’s a real nuisance for people to access it, your trade will go down.

Unfortunately, there’s an even bigger, long term economic cost. Like all cities we need investments of wealth, skill and talent to secure our economic future. The people who have those things can go anywhere they want. If we let our region become a congested mess, do you really think they’ll want to come here? Congestion is like a cancer, it grows and it does no good at all.  Let’s move to prevent  it NOW.

Complete Communities

Complete communities aim to provide opportunities to live, work and play in an attractive environment that residents can enjoy.

Such communities help transportation woes by reducing trips residents need to take. That’s a very good thing. Naturally, people will still want to move around now and then. After all, you’re in a city. There are so many great things to see and do. But, reduce trips to “want to” rather than “have to” and your transportation system should benefit.

To get these benefits, however, we must be particularly careful with community design. It’s helpful to provide grocery stores, recreation facilities and other services near by but we can do more. We should aim to make these communities as attractive and comfortable to live in as single family. That means carefully designed local greenspaces and more. It’s not an easy task but it’s worth taking on.

Comprehensive, long term planning is critical to success. Approving project’s as “one-offs” just won’t cut it. We need a very good blueprint of the end product we aim to reach. Ignore the blueprint and complete communities are more likely to become a complete mess.

Over the last few years, I’ve created an approach to urban sustainability called the Natural City. It addresses, at length, the issue of building new, complete communities. Watch for a presentation in your area.