Sand in the gears

In other writings, I've made the observation that government in any guise should do only those things that are not in the best interest of the individual but which are in the best interests of the population as a whole.

The last thing that government should ever do is put sand in the gears of society; even if they think (can any group of people actually be said to "think"?) that the outcome might be "a good thing" for the population as a whole.

Here in the Vancouver area we have an organization called "Translink" that is charged with greasing the wheels of transportation around our area. They have been given the responsibility of public transit as well as major roads not already administered by senior levels of government (i.e. the Feds and the Province) and maybe even them.

The problem is, as with many other jurisdictions in North America and the world these days, the responsibility didn't necessarily come with the authority, or at least the funding. Translink has too much responsibility and not enough money it seems, so they are being inventive with a couple of the few powers they have to raise money, namely property tax and parking tax.

The most recent proposal they have floated is to institute a parking tax on all the spaces around the various malls and grocery stores in the suburbs. Their explanation is that since they (Translink) have such a tax on downtown Vancouver, where all the executives drive and park their single-occupant vehicles to get to work, it is only fitting that the rest of us out in the 'burbs pay such a tax as well since we also get the benefit of public transit and neat connecting roads. I note that the downtown merchants object vehemently to any increase on their current parking taxes too, citing that it would drive their customers out to the suburban shopping areas even more than now.

The problem is that Translink is far too late into the game to understand the reality of the situation. They only see the fact that transit is costly and the road infrastructure is inadequate. What they don't see is that much of the problem stems from their predecessors in various levels of government and the problem can neither be resolved by further taxes nor ignored - a catch-22 if there ever was one.

When I grew up in the '50s, we had "the 6th store" - a small convenience store in the middle of our neighbourhood and 4 blocks from the main shopping area of 10th Avenue in Point Grey, Vancouver. We could get milk, bread, various canned goods and some frozen goods as well as the typical chocolate bars and "pop" that I as a growing child couldn't get enough of.

My mother and I (and later, my brothers) could walk to 10th Ave. to get groceries every day. Many times I was sent to the local bakery to get bread and ended up getting home with only half a loaf because I ate the rest of the still-warm bread on the way home. Milk was delivered to us, initially by horse-drawn cart but mostly by truck (I'm not all that old, but we had a dairy just down the hill from us and they used horses until the mid '50s when they sold out to a larger firm, now "Dairyland".) I can still remember being most annoyed at having to carry a mere 2 quarts of milk the 3 blocks to home from the local Safeway after the 6th store folded.

We had a single car which my father used to get to work at Vancouver International Airport where he worked as a Customs officer. I learned to ride the bus to places like the YMCA on Burrard street and the Bay on Granville to the point that when I finally did get my license and drove downtown one Saturday, I forgot and took the bus home! ("Where's the car?" "Oh Sh&t, I left it in the Bay parkade!")

Today on the other hand, there are few convenience stores deep in the residential areas and most people purchase their food in bulk quantities that simply can't be carried very far. They need a vehicle if they are feeding any more than just themselves. In addition, the distance to work for most of us is such that we are either doomed to spend a significant portion of our "free" time just commuting, or we in fact "can't get there from here" via public transit that is oriented towards movement to/from downtown Vancouver, not between the suburbs.

And now, Translink in their infinite wisdom (or their bottomless pit of need) want to charge me and my family a tax to park close to the one place we must visit with our vehicles - the supermarket. They also want to charge us to park close to the rest of the stores we must visit now that they have been relegated to a mall, but that is a minor thing in comparison.

I might consider this justified if a bus came to the doorstep of my home (or the end of the block) and the bus driver was charged with helping my wife (or me) to carry the week's purchases from the supermarket or warehouse-store to the bus, protect it from others (and from thawing) and to the doorstop of my home (or even the curb.)

Otherwise, they can look elsewhere for their dollars, I'm not participating in this rape!

We can't afford the time to purchase fresh food in small quantities (even if we could find it in small quantities) every day anymore. In fact, with a jumbo package of "Raisin Bran" at Costco costing less than a standard pack from the local Safeway or 7-11, most of us can't afford to shop in small quantities at all. We have to shop in amounts that add up to tens or even hundreds of pounds of weight (ok, 5KG to 50KG in Canada - I told you I grew up in the '50s) so we need to take our vehicle to the store! There are almost no sidewalks from the local bulk purchase place to my home and the supermarkets don't allow us to take a shopping cart off the lot anymore either.

I pay copious dollars to the Federal government in my gas taxes - and maybe the locals will get some of it back, maybe they won't - depends on the honour of our still to be crowned "new Prime Minister".

I pay other dollars to the Provincial government that don't seem to be enough or well spent.

I even pay my local government a couple of thousand dollars a year, just to see the grocery store that was within walking distance close because council approved (and encouraged) a development movement out of the downtown and towards the Lougheed Highway several blocks away. They continue this by allowing a major mall initiative even farther away (nearer to Maple Ridge) that promises to sink those few merchants left nearby.

Somewhere there is a plan. I know there is, Shirley, my wife, has seen it! She is an Urban Geographer (it says so on her bachelors' degree anyway) and she looked long and hard at the various parts of the regional plans before we purchased our home here in Pitt Meadows 10 years ago. The problem it seems is that the plan doesn't have any teeth and the various local governments, colluded with by the Provincial government, have made Swiss cheese of it in various ways making it useless.

instead of building up, we've moved out - taking up valuable (to those of us who want to eat) agricultural land and increasing the cost of commuting from home to work. The cost has increased not only in our gas, but in our time and in the amount of tax we must pay to build and support the transportation infrastructure. We've also been hornswaggled by big business (the car, tire and petroleum industries at least) into abandoning our earlier transport infrastructure like trolleys, streetcars, and light-rail transit; all of which Vancouver had in the past.

It is not possible to put the stuff back into Pandora's box. All we can do is not take any more out. We have to either bow to the likelihood that the personal automobile in some form or other is going to remain the dominant form of transport and give up the idea that we can get people to give it up through any form of coercion (taxes, sh&tty infrastructure, etc.) or we have to give the likes of Translink the ability to not only deal with the problem but also the cause - urban sprawl.

Only by limiting or eliminating urban sprawl will we be able to justify the creation of public transit systems that get people to where they need to be, in a timely fashion, and with the amenities necessary close at hand. The higher densities that limiting urban sprawl will engender will make the return of local (within walking distance) amenities price competitive with the way things are today. In some cases different legislation will also have to be imposed on local governments - things like allowing local pubs within walking distance of all residential areas (an obvious example of things that some see as undesirable but which includes businesses of many types - Laundromats, pool-halls, theatres, youth-oriented stores, etc.) so they no longer are doomed to congregate in areas that become destinations requiring cars and lots of parking.

If transportation infrastructure is necessary for our lives, then everyone must bear the cost. Today this means either income or property taxes (not that they are in any way fair, but they are at least relatively ubiquitous.) It does not mean "user pay" systems such as parking fees in our malls, even if they are hidden in increased property taxes for mall owners - we still end up paying.

If we have to have a parking "tax", putting parking meters at the local mall simply adds a level of bureaucracy between those paying and the eventual destination of the money. The added cost of the bureaucracy diminishes the sum collected and therefore the "public" benefit. If any surcharge for "parking" must be imposed, it must be done in such a way that it does not add to bureaucracy - so must come with a law that the amount cannot be downloaded (by the property owners) to the visitor/customer in the form of direct payment at meters (meaning it must be added into rents charged to the tenants and therefore into our prices at the checkout - but at least all people would end up paying and there would be no added bureaucracy.)

Of course the problem with such a restriction is that many will drive to outlying areas where no such tax is collected (like I and others close by travel to Mission for gas because they don't have a transit levy) thereby further distorting the economics of the market.

I'm not sure there is a real solution. What I am sure of is that more and different taxation in any form is part of the problem, not part of any solution.