The City of Prince Rupert now has a blue print for its Transportation ambitions, but how it all comes together over the next ten years will bring largely a wait and see approach, that as City Council puts primary focus on its much discussed infrastructure woes.
The new plan which took over a year to complete was released as part of the July 24th Council session, with Brian Patterson from Urban Systems providing the tutorial for council members and those viewing at home as to the many elements that make up the expansive document.
The purpose of the plan was to highlight the infrastructure priorities over the next 5-10 years ahead, focused on four areas, model interconnectivity, active transportation, public transportation and Driving elements.
Mr. Patterson explains that the process of development was taken on over the course of the last year, included in that overview was a look at some of the community engagement that led to the development of the final plan and how to implement it in a phased approach.
The Transportation plan has also incorporated a range of other civic initiatives such as play spaces and parking planning into the document.
With the city currently engaged in infrastructure replacement, it was noted that some of the elements of the Transportation strategy could be incorporated and integrated into some of that work that is coming up in the near future.
Towards questions Councillor Adey observed of the scope of the project, noting of the city's past work on the 2030 Vision plan and how he had the same feeling towards some of the elements that may be more aspirational than practical at the moment.
"There's a lot of work that goes into putting something like this together ... and I reflect in being involved in developing the 2030 plan a number of years ago and how exciting it was because it was such an aspirational document.
But at the same time feeing like, you know, that sceptical ... you know ghost on the shoulder saying that this is never going to happen, there's too much here.
I kind of have the same feeling here about this one.
But I think that the benefit is that it's a framework and it's a plan that is in place and from this point you can begin to consider those ideas that are in there that are really good that you can implement tin combination with some of the things we have to do anyway" -- Councillor Nick Adey
Councillor Adey and others around the Chamber had more to add during the Regular Council session, with praise for the work of the report but caution as to any anticipation that elements would be adopted in any quick fashion.
"We're not going to be able to slice and dice the whole thing in any reasonable time nor should we try. It's a document, it's available to the public and I would encourage people who are interested to put some time into having a look at it. ...
This is just one step in improving the Transportation system in Prince Rupert, arguably the first step and achieving all of it, to be realistic is extremely expensive and therefore in the immediate term prohibitive .
I think we have to understand that, that doesn't mean that we don't support it, or I won't support it. It just means that I understand that not all of what is in there is achievable in the immediate term -- Councillor Nick Adey
Councillor Wade Niesh echoed many of Councillor Adey's themes in his commentary.
"Basically along the same lines, the reality is if you asked us tomorrow to approve any of these projects on this Transportation plan we would have to say no, it's just not a reality. It's a plan that was you know paid for through a grant and it is a big plan, it's a lot of pages of a lot of different ideas and a lot of different maps.
I don't feel that, you known, we're in any situation other than when we tear up a street and we are putting it back together, we may be able to throw in certain portions of this. That being said, I'm not trying to take away from the report itself, the reality is that I don't see us in any financial position to be able to do much in this transportation plan."
Councillor Barry Cunningham also framed his comments in much the same vein.
"It's a great wish list and even when we're putting the streets back together, you just explained how people are going to be inconvenienced and we're going to be wanting to put that street back together and get to the next street. And by adding more work it's just not going to work ...
Great Saturday/Sunday reading if you really are bored, I suggest people read it, it's a great document and that but I'm just worried that right now our needs are under the ground and not above the ground ...
It's a great report, but it lacks one thing, the cost of some of these things. I would love to have seen even a little bit of the cost of it and I believe it would be in the millions and millions of dollars and that's just something that we can't entertain that right now. We're struggling just to put what we really need in the ground back together"
"The gravity of our current infrastructure challenges is certainly evident in the comments that Council is making, we completely understand that and are encouraged by that understanding.
In that we are focusing our efforts where they need to be focused because a failed water system and sewer system means that we have a failed city, which impacts everybody's livelihoods and property values and so forth.
So we are focused on the right area.
But we're good at doing more than one thing at the same time and what this strategy does and it is aspiration as is the 2030, as is the OCP it lays out a framework for a better future.
It lays out a framework that achieves many values and many important goals in the most effective way.
Having a document like this allow us then to be informed when we speak with the Ministry of Transportation. It allows us to speak with other government agencies in an informed way about what we want for our infrastructure.
It gives staff direction in terms of where they focus and we're very good at this; is as is evidenced by you know all the grants we get. Where we focus our grant applications, whee we focus our efforts in putting things back better within the budget that we have.
So I take this as more than just aspirational, I take this as you know informing how we conduct our work to be as productive and beneficial as possible going forward.
And I'm convinced that we will be able to achieve a lot of this in our efforts over the next decade and by the time we're ready to review this, I think that we'll see that, I'm being optimistic and justifiably so, we'll have achieved a lot.
So I think it's an important document and I appreciate the work that Director Pope and our consultant Brian Patterson have done in this and I think that it's a very nice thing"
The Full presentation to Council can be viewed through the City's video archive starting that the 15 minute mark of the July Council session. Follow up comments on the plan are also available for review at the 46 minute mark.
A short synopsis of the Transportation plan was included as part of the agenda for the meeting, which you can review here.
The full report can be accessed here.
More notes from the July 24th session can be explored here.
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