Stephen Rees's blog

This story comes from Britain where a county council has teamed up with environmentalists to do a proper study of a road scheme and real alternatives. It is constrcutive, and shows what you can do if you look at your options carefully.

It stands in stark contrast to the methodology now in use in BC. Here the “solution” is decided first, then the studies are dummied up to make the sums work out in favour of the preferred project. A huge mass of documentation is then assembled and dumped into the public domain in the hopes that people will not have the time to read all of it and notice what is wrong and what is missing. And any public servant who murmurs about this process has an early retirement party.

Unsurprisingly in this case, investments in public transport and traffic management are shown to be better investments than road building. That is often, but not invariably the case. But it also shows that there is real value in doing studies properly. For the assessment process does cost money and it is not just there as a way of making road building more difficult. It has a useful purpose, and politicians who respect the public purse will understand that. Only those who pursue other agendas, such as facilitating property development, would have a different view. And it appears that Mr Falcon has in fact put those interests in front of all others in the cases of Eagleridge Bluffs, the Sea to Sky in general, and the Gateway road projects.