>

cad

north shore news

a — MAIL Box
& seymour area all

 .. Dear Editor:

Re: Commuting from

East of the Seymour River

My huszand arid J are sit-
ting in our <a on Dollarton

ighway, lined up to get
onto the Second Narrows
Bridge to go to work down-
town. When we moved to

North Vancouver, east of the .

Seymour River, over two
years ago, one of the attrac-
tions was the short commute
to work every morning.

On a norma! day, it took
20 'to 25 minutes to get to
work, but now the commute

s at least 40 minutes a
day and ‘usually more like 50

ade. the line-up ended at
the Crab Shack: Now, it
almost seems to be a good
day if we are only backed up
y the Crab Shack. :
? What are the some of the
i le explanations for this
significant worsening in, traf-
fic volume?
it because the Keith
d on-ramp was perma-
tly closed in 1996?
As a result of that closure,
lanes of traffic from

has only one westbound lane
‘and cannot handle the addi-
‘tional volume, hence the
bs

‘Editor: ‘
23-31 am a resident and parent
‘two young children who
the crosswalk at the cor-
: of © Eddystone and

outh,
This is a very dangerous
place for children and adults
to cross. BC Transit can con-
firm. this. After all, they
moved their bus stop a few
feet down the street. I was
Mtold they did this because
people would come around

Meathat corner at high rates of

speed. In the few years that
my: children have been

‘ melattending Plymouth clemen-

school, | have witnessed
any close calls.

“I -feel ir is time to make

his concern public. My hus-

band was almost rear-ended

by someone when he stopped

allow. some children to

. The other driver had

© nerve to get our of his

Mehicle and curse at him for
weestopping to aliow the chil-

mairen to cross. | have watched
many . so-called professional
Hrivers go through this cross-

alk at high rates of speed.

backup of traffic on that
route.

Is it because of the road-
work on McGill Street on the
Vancouver side of the bridge?

Thanks to Vancouver City
outside workez;’ strike this
summer, the Renfrew Street
overpass work has been
unnecessarily drawn out and
is perhaps slowing the traffic,
However, given that the traf-
fic spreads out on the bridge
deck, I don’t think the
Vancouver side of the bridge
should take the blame.

Is it because of develop-
ment east of the Seymour
River?

Developments such as
Raven Woods bring more
people and more traffic to
the North Shore and the traf-
fic infrastructure cannot ban-

* die ix.

What happens if the 600-
plus unit development north
of the Tarkwa y or other pro-

levelopments £0
ahead?

We have already stated
that the Parkway and
Doliarton Highway routes
cannot handle the current
rush hour volumes so how
will they handle any further
increase?

Ts it because commuters
are experiencing more stalls
and accidents?

What used to be a month-
ly occurrence now seems to
be a twice-weekly occurrence.
Can people not afford to
properly maintain their cars
and keep them full of gas?

~ Who knows which of
these possible explanations is
the biggest cause? All we
know is that we experience
significant frustration every

day.

Slow down before
schildren are killed

When ‘I can, I get a
licence plate and call the
company, but at the speeds
they travel this is not always
possible. I have seen a BC
transit supervisor, a North
Shore Taxi driver, a Sunshine
Cab driver, a Dynamex
Courier driver and a Canada
Post driver all going over the
speed limit through this
crosswalk which is very close
to a school zone.

Just the other day, some-
one was almost rear-ended,
because he stopped to allow
me and my children to cross
at the crosswalk. The driver
of the truck came speeding
around the corner and had to
swerve to avoid hitting the
car that was stopped.

A lot of people think that
Plymouth Drive is a part of
the Indy race track, because
of the hill and all the sharp
corners. It’s not — so slow
down, before you take a
child’s life and have to live
with this tragedy for the rest
of your hte.

Lianna Martin
North Vancouver

‘tied up in traffic

In thinking of ways to
alleviate that frustration, an
obvious solution is transit.
However, transit is not an
answer as we would still have
to sit in these traffic line-ups
to get to Lonsdale Quay to
take the SeaBus.-

Looming on the horizon
is the opening of the Real
Car-adian Superstore on
Mount Seymour Parkway.

Was any thought put into
the extra traffic volume and
the flow thereof resulting
from the development?

One solution over which
the residents have total con-
trol is for more of our fellow
residents to double up and
replace two cars on the road,
each with only a driver, with
one car on the road with a
driver and passenger. At least
that would halve the cars on
the read until some feasible
long-term plans can be devel-
oped by the three North
Shore municipalities to cffec-
tively handle the increased
traffic that is a reality of con-
tinued growth.

Linda and Rob Castagna
North Vancouver

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wi

Those of you who have been directly
involved in federal election campaigns
can relate to the excitement and disap-
pointments which are an integral part of
the process. Candidates’ agendas are
filled with coffee parties, door-knocking,
public meetings, barbecues, and speak-
ing opportunities, but ultimatsly, the
“Holy Grail” of politics is te elect a
Member of Parliament with the hope of
effecting change on a national or inter-
national scale. Then, after the dust set-
tles, the newly elected set off to Ottawa
to begin using their skills, optimism and
keen sense of social justice in the “Big

_House” to enhance the lives of their fel-

fow Canadians. .

Sadly, this optimism usually quickly
deteriorates into frustration and apathy as
the hard work and good ideas of MPs seem
to go nowhere. Meanwhile, the public,
watching their newly-minted MPs disap-
pear into the haze of Parliament Hill, find
their cynicism over the institution and coun-
try deepening. But is it our MPs who are the
problem or is it something else?

BEHIND THE SCENES

As the saying goes, there are two things
that one should never see being made; hot-
dogs and legislation. Students of federal
Politics can certainty attest to the latter,

| because although we are supposed to

have a democracy based on the British
Westminster mode, in reality we have a
bastardized system — a distinctly “made-in-
Canada” version that more closely resem-
bles a medieval fiefdom than a democracy.
To better understand this Byzantine world,
it helps to peer into the hailowed halls of
Partiament Hill in order to study its players.
Such an investigation quickly confirms the
suspicion that if President Clinton had the
power of our Prime Minister he would be
doing cartwheels down the White House
fawn.

Our P.M, enjoys more power than the
leader of virtually any Western democracy.
All major decisions which affect our coun-
try, and most minor ones, come from the
Prime Minister, a few Cabinet Ministers,
and a small group of advisors in the Prime
Minister's office (PMO). This latter group is
made up of unelected, unaccountable and
largely invisible individuals, whose primary
role is the maintenance or acquisition of
power. It is because of this concentration of
power in the Prime Minister's Office that the
preceedings of the House of Commens
often more closely resemble the antics of a
sugar-overdosed group of seven-year-olds
than the deliberations of the highest level of
elected representatives in the land.
Speeches in the House are usually
not constructive, and have a clang-
ing similarity to each other because
the vast majority of members are
told what to say via “talking points”
provided by the party organization.
Then, during votes, MPs act like a
group of lemmings following their
leader to a predetermined outcome.

POWER AND FEAR

To the average person, the above
described behaviour probably seems quite
bizarre, but there is a simple reason for it -
fear. Members work in a culture of fear, for
to go against the wishes of the elite invites
disciplinary action from the Party Whip,
who is also an MP. This person's role is to
force back-benchers to do the elite's bid-

t ding via the tried and true “carrot and stick”
f approach which

rewards MPs with
Parliamentary trips, speaking opportunities
in the House, membership on the House

advertorial, November 5/97

A HOUSE OF ILLUSIONS

Standing Committees of their choice, re-
election support, and perhaps one day, pro-
motion to the position of the ultimate
Honourable Member — a Cabinet Minister.
Anyone daring to break out of the mold by
initiating new, innovative ideas not sanc-
tioned by the elite, or by publicly disagree-
ing with their policies, will be penalized by
being removed from committee duties, not
being allowed to debate or ask questions in
the House, or by being expelled from the
Farty — an action which usually kills
chances for re-election. Unfortunately. the
process effectively renders most MPs
impotent because it is much less stressful
simply to conform. After ail, MPs have fam-
ilies to feed, and bills to pay, just like other
working Canadians.

The theory of course, is that in a democ-
racy the people are meant to have effective
input into the legislative process via MPs, [|
and through forums provided by parliamen-
tary committees. These groups are sup-
posed to independently facilitate public
input, advise the Minister, and modify new
legislation before it becomes law, but the
teaiiy is quite different. Committees study
what the Minister dictates, which is either
an insignificant issue in the portfolio, or one
that has been studied many times in the
past. After thousands of dollars have been
spent, hours of testimony by learned mem-
bers of the public, and hundreds of hours of
work by MPs, the committee releases its
findings. This final report will perhaps
receive a little media attention before being
tossed-on a shelf te collect dust with many
similar reports dealing with the same sub-
ject and saying much the same thing.

The real role of committees is
twofold. Firstly, to keep MPs busy,
and in doing so to give them less
time to engage in independent
thought and actions. Secondly, they
give the public the illusion that the
government is busy attempting to
resolve issues. in fact, commissioning a
study is a favourite method used by
Parliament to delay making a decision, the
granddaddy of all studies being the Royal
Commission. Witness the 1996 study on
Aboriginal Affairs which took over three
years to complete, cost $60 million, and
has been ail but shelved.

WE ALL LOSE

The overwhelming sense of frustra-
tion that people feel towards our system
of governance is shared by most MPs,
but ironically, it was precisely this frus-
tration which drove them to run for
office in the first place. Sadly, what they
found was a structure controlled by a
tiny elite, many of whom are unelected, |
and unaccountable, a place where the
maintenance or acquisition of power is
the primary goal, and an environment
where solving the preblems of the
nation becomes merely the backdrop
against which the game is played. The
system squashes independent thought,
thereby fostering weak-mindedness
amongst our feaders, who usually pur-
sue an agenda completely out of touch
with the will of those who pay the cost
through their taxes and government
encroachment into their lives. The
Canadian Parliament is a place where
MPs find a fiefdom - not a House of
Commons, but 2 House of illusions. It is
a system in which we all lose, and there
is tittle sign of change on the horizon.
{Credit for much of the above material goes to Reform

MP Keith Martin, who wrote an article for the
Montreal Gazette on the sare subject.)

- Ted White, MLP. , #302-1200 Lynn Valley Road, North Vancouver, B.C. V7} 2A2
TeL: 666-0585 Fax: 666-0509, Internet: http://www.reform.ca/white-t/ .