Russ Wyatt’s Antics Nothing More Than Fear Mongering
Russ Wyatt claims the Pedestrian & Cycling Strategies are flawed because of a lack of consultations, alleging that advocacy groups like Bike Winnipeg have undue influence at city hall (we wish!).
3,000 People Engaged in Public Consultation Process
Like the rest of the public, we first saw the completed strategies (and proposed cycling network) on May 1st. That’s not to say we and the rest of the city didn’t have plenty of time to review and comment on the strategies. 18 months of public consultations on the strategies culminated in three open houses in April 2014. The consultation process engaged over 3,000 people.
Over 3,000 people were engaged in the public consultation process for the Pedestrian & Cycling Strategies
Draft Networks and Recommendations Have Been Available for 12 Months
Bike Winnipeg and hundreds of other Winnipeggers took advantage of that time to comment on the draft network and recommendations.
We were pleased to see those contributions reflected in the documents released May 1st.
Wyatt’s so-called evidence that Bike Winnipeg had prior access to the strategies is an email we sent him on January 23, 2015 asking for a meeting to discuss opportunities to improve cycling options in Transcona and throughout the City of Winnipeg. You can read the full text of that email at bikewinnipeg.ca.
Councillor Wyatt failed to respond to our invitation.
Full text of Bike Winnipeg Invitation to Russ Wyatt
Hi Russ,
Hope you are getting settled into your new job! We’re still hoping that we might be be able to meet with you and discuss opportunities to improve cycling options in the Transcona ward and throughout the City of Winnipeg. There has certainly been a lot of work in Transcona (Transcona Trail , Pandora, Chief Peguis extension, Kilcona Park Planning, and recent neighbourhood plans), and more to come with planning underway for the East Rapid Transit Corridor. Ensuring that these new communities and pathways connect into the rest of the city is a critical issue for Bike Winnipeg (and we are sure yourself as well), and we would very much like to get your ideas on development of the cycling network into and within Transcona, and to share some of our ideas with you and get your feedback on our ideas and the plan in general.
We are expecting that the City of Winnipeg will be tabling its first ever pedestrian and cycling strategies before the standing committee on infrastructure renewal and public works on February 10th. We would love to have the opportunity to speak with you about our desires for the passage and implementation of this critical city planning document. If you would be interested in meeting with myself and perhaps one or two other members of the Bike Winnipeg board, please feel free to give me a call at 204-894-6540 or reply by email (mark@bikewinnipeg.ca).
I’m generally available to meet during the day, and was hoping that we could perhaps set something up over the next two weeks. I look forward to working with you to help make Winnipeg a safer, more convenient place to bike!
Sincerely,
Mark Cohoe
Executive Director
Bike Winnipeg
www.bikewinnipeg.ca
204-894-6540
If you would cycle into work regularly like I do, you would see how badly we need safe, separate and protected bike lanes going into downtown. I shouldn’t have to fear for my life just going to work.
No one should.
I’m sorry to say but i feel the city and province with there lack of money need to be concentrating on or current crumbling infrastructure before we can look at supplying cyclist with there own path, especially since motorist pay for the infrastructure to be built and maintained with the taxes they pay at the pump and cyclist do not.
Aaron,
It is a common myth that fuel taxes pay for our streets. The truth is that taxes paid on fuel taxes pay for less than half of our roadway construction costs. The largest contributor to roadway construction costs is the average property tax payer. In Winnipeg, additional funding for roadways comes form water and sewer rates, and of course from the PST. Remember, gasoline and diesel are exempt from the PST, which further exasperates the disparity. For a good article on the true costs of our roads and who pays for them, we recommend a look at this article on the Victoria Transport Policy Institute website – Whose Roads? (http://www.vtpi.org/whoserd.pdf).
I will agree that the tax dollers are not used where they are suppose to be the tax at the pump is suppose to be for the roads, but that is still a chunk of tax that is only paid by the automobile driver. Also the point that our current infrastructure is crumbling and should be taken care of first is still valid. We simply can not afford to make new bike paths when the road next to it is falling apart.
I ride each Sunday 80–100k When on a multi-lane street like Grant/Roblin my riding buddy & I take up most of the curb lane ; resulting in cars giving us the lane. Wouldn’t it be a great idea to legislate this on Sundays & holidays?