HRM charter changes proposed to speed up housing builds

[OldDartmouthMark]

Originally Posted by ILoveHalifax

Sad that my comments about Larry Uteck caused such a kerfuffle -

No worries there, it's all on me. I was dumb enough to get suckered into that, when I normally should know better than to take the bait.

Oh well... there's several minutes of my life that I'll never get back...

[OldDartmouthMark]

Originally Posted by Good Baklava

I mean, I know you’re a car guy, so it’s not wild to think you enter the conversation looking to make a point against walkable/active transportation arguments.
(Edit: at least in their most imposing forms).

One final point and then I'm done with this thread.

I feel must apologize to Keith P., MonctonRad, and any other member who had mentioned the "war on the car" phenomenon. Any time it had been mentioned in the past, I pushed back against the idea, thinking it was ludicrous. I mean, people have their preferences, but most people want to live and let live, don't they? They will gravitate towards their style of living and let others do the same... or so I believed.

I'm now believing more and more that I was wrong... Thinking a little more about the comment posted above leads me to believe that there is something to it. I had mentioned my like of cars in other threads (and in the Canada section - I'm assuming Mr. Baklava searched out my past posts, or has an incredible memory)... so immediately this gets tossed out there. In his mind (and I now assume this mindset is shared by many others), I couldn't possibly discuss this topic in good faith because I like cars, and therefore must automatically be on the 'wrong' side of the "war on the car". A persona non grata as such.

So, gentlemen, please accept my apology - you were right and I was wrong.

Over and out.

[Keith P.]

Apology accepted (but unnecessary).

The war on the car is part of modern planning dogma. We see it in practice within HRM every day, as enabled by our utterly inept Council. Although now it seems they have pivoted to waging war on parks and the residents who reside close by.

[LikesBikes]

Originally Posted by Keith P.

The war on the car is part of modern planning dogma. .

Is it though? Halifax is as car dominated as every other city on the continent, more or less. In its most recent budget, there seems to be more attention for electric vehicles than actually reducing VMT. At the provincial and federal levels too, the push is for electric cars, not no cars. If there is a place truly waging war on cars, I'd like to see it.

I agree that most planners are increasingly recognizing that putting everyone in cars is not a good way to run a city, as they should. Cars have enormous financial, environmental, health, and social costs that other modes of transport do not. I suspect the reason there is a growing movement about urbanism is that people are finally recognizing these costs, recognizing the impending climate catastrophe and the role cars play in it, and increased attention as a result of new media shining light on this topic which historically has not seen the light of day outside of urban planning circles. All the while, politicians on the left push electric cars on us and politicians on the right complain about urbanites and deny climate change is real.

[Keith P.]

Originally Posted by LikesBikes

Is it though? Halifax is as car dominated as every other city on the continent, more or less. In its most recent budget, there seems to be more attention for electric vehicles than actually reducing VMT. At the provincial and federal levels too, the push is for electric cars, not no cars. If there is a place truly waging war on cars, I'd like to see it.

The HRM fetish with electric vehicles is just more of the virtue signaling for which they are famous. Electrics bring with them great environmental impact related to their manufacturing, and with the generation of the electricity needed for them if you are not on a hydro-electric grid.

I agree that most planners are increasingly recognizing that putting everyone in cars is not a good way to run a city, as they should. Cars have enormous financial, environmental, health, and social costs that other modes of transport do not. I suspect the reason there is a growing movement about urbanism is that people are finally recognizing these costs, recognizing the impending climate catastrophe and the role cars play in it, and increased attention as a result of new media shining light on this topic which historically has not seen the light of day outside of urban planning circles. All the while, politicians on the left push electric cars on us and politicians on the right complain about urbanites and deny climate change is real.

All modes of transport carry cost burdens associated with them, so that statement is foolish. Walking, for those who can physically do it, brings tremendous time cost. Cycling brings slightly less of that but adds the cost of potential injury and death from the inevitable mishaps. Public transit brings massive infrastructure and operating costs for what is in many cases like that of HRM less convenience and greater time expended.

The definition of dogma is "a principle or set of principles laid down by an authority as incontrovertibly true". Your statement is a good example of that.

[TheNovaScotian]

Cars were the weapon of choice during "modern planing" of the 60's in the war against the cities full of poor people. IMO

Take Detroit for example, hollowed out by the same thing that made it boom.
Now all the money in Michigan is an hours drive down the road in Auburn Hills and the other suburbs around the city. Detroit didn't fail, the plan worked perfectly to Henry Fords design. Rich people out in the suburbs, poor people stuck in the cities next to the factories.

When analyzed in the grand view, Urban Planning is pretty insidious. Things like redlining, highway projects cutting through established neighborhoods or caveats about what ethnicity can move where, are all throughout its short history as a formal field of study. Urban Planning as a field of study generally started during the time of industrialists making factory towns where they wanted people to drink less and work harder. It's been a tool of the rich and powerful from the beginning and the car allowed the rich to run away from cities in record numbers.

If you want a good example of how we went from walk-able communities to drive-able ones, open Google Maps, take a look at North End Halifax and just follow the Bedford Basin. You have a nice and tight grid built in the early 1900's slowly moving towards Fairview / Dutch Village with a looser gird then you hit Clayton Park. It starts to have those undulating connector roads between two highways. Everything from there is just offshoots of the feeder roads and quiet winding cul-de-sacs. New schools, more highways and infrastructure need to be built, service extended out to sparsely populated areas. Maximizing an inefficient and costly land-use pattern that drains public coffers more and more each year. As the most successful cities globally tend to not prescribe to this North American sensation.

North American planners, don't even know what a walk-able community is, partially due to being told to ensure parking is reliably available in every facet of "the city" for so long. Starved of resources because of the sprawl now most cities in NA have to accept whatever developers propose instead of demanding better.
If you want an example of how that works, take Inglis St. in the South End, it smells like raw sewage during the summer. After paying taxes for 200 years even before Halifax Water rates existed, those taxpayers have subsidized each expansion of Clayton Park all the way out to Larry Uteck. They've laid enough sewer-lines for what's there as well for expansion of those suburbs but homeowners in the heart of the city don't have that luxury. They have to live with the smell of raw sewage. Too cash strapped to make a proper fix they live with band-aid solutions and parking garages full of the shit.

So in short, the generation that loved cars might be the only ones who get the chance to, as the real costs are slowly being revealed.

[LikesBikes]

Originally Posted by Keith P.

Walking, for those who can physically do it, brings tremendous time cost. Cycling brings slightly less of that but adds the cost of potential injury and death from the inevitable mishaps. Public transit brings massive infrastructure and operating costs for what is in many cases like that of HRM less convenience and greater time expended.

Walking doesn't have a tremendous time cost in neighbourhoods that weren't built primarily around the car. In fact, walking is often just as quick as driving in many places, such as where I am now.

Cycling can be dangerous, yes. So I assume you're for building more protected bike lanes then?

Public transit projects can be expensive but so is car infrastructure, which nobody blinks an eye at.

In general, each of these transportation modes is cheaper for the traveler, better for the environment, safer for society, and require less financial resources from the city to maintain. Check out Strong Towns for the stats on this.

Originally Posted by Keith P.

The definition of dogma is "a principle or set of principles laid down by an authority as incontrovertibly true". Your statement is a good example of that.

This is ironic given 99% of your posts are unsubstantiated claims about why the HRM and cyclists are terrible.

[Keith P.]

Originally Posted by LikesBikes

Cycling can be dangerous, yes. So I assume you're for building more protected bike lanes then?

No, I'm for getting cyclists off the roads entirely and putting them on sidewalks where they would be in a more fair fight with pedestrians instead of cars and trucks.

[kzt79]

Originally Posted by Keith P.

No, I'm for getting cyclists off the roads entirely and putting them on sidewalks where they would be in a more fair fight with pedestrians instead of cars and trucks.

As someone who drives and also occasional cycles, I would also strongly favour this approach!

[LikesBikes]

And make the street pedestrian only? Ya, I could get behind that I guess.

[Hali87]

I'll mention a few points:

In the thought experiment above, it's clear that moving bike traffic from the streets to the sidewalks would make for a worse pedestrian experience. When there is no dedicated lane for bikes, it's not uncommon to see them using the sidewalk. On the other hand, I don't think I've ever seen a cyclist riding on the sidewalk when there's a bike lane available - so adding bike lanes tends to also make things better for pedestrians, which (even if people think this is stupid) is definitely something else that the city is trying to encourage.

I understand the point of view "people will choose to live in neighbourhoods that fit their lifestyle and will choose to either own a car or not, depending on their preferences". In reality it's not this simple though - cost/affordability is a much more critical factor than I think a lot of people realize. Fewer and fewer people really have a choice, and in practice the only option available to a lot of people is to live without a car in an area that was inherently designed for people with cars. As the Peninsula becomes more expensive, this will happen more and more unless other neighbourhoods are designed to prioritize pedestrians (which, to be fair, is happening in many other areas if we zoom out from Larry Uteck).

There absolutely are cyclists who antagonize drivers and want to do things "just to piss them off", just as there are drivers who hate cyclists and actively wish harm on them. Overall most people do just want to get along and I don't think either of those groups should be seen as representative although they tend to be loud on the internet.

[LikesBikes]

Originally Posted by Hali87

I'll mention a few points:

In the thought experiment above, it's clear that moving bike traffic from the streets to the sidewalks would make for a worse pedestrian experience. When there is no dedicated lane for bikes, it's not uncommon to see them using the sidewalk. On the other hand, I don't think I've ever seen a cyclist riding on the sidewalk when there's a bike lane available - so adding bike lanes tends to also make things better for pedestrians, which (even if people think this is stupid) is definitely something else that the city is trying to encourage.

I understand the point of view "people will choose to live in neighbourhoods that fit their lifestyle and will choose to either own a car or not, depending on their preferences". In reality it's not this simple though - cost/affordability is a much more critical factor than I think a lot of people realize. Fewer and fewer people really have a choice, and in practice the only option available to a lot of people is to live without a car in an area that was inherently designed for people with cars. As the Peninsula becomes more expensive, this will happen more and more unless other neighbourhoods are designed to prioritize pedestrians (which, to be fair, is happening in many other areas if we zoom out from Larry Uteck).

There absolutely are cyclists who antagonize drivers and want to do things "just to piss them off", just as there are drivers who hate cyclists and actively wish harm on them. Overall most people do just want to get along and I don't think either of those groups should be seen as representative although they tend to be loud on the internet.

Agree 100%

[OldDartmouthMark]

Originally Posted by LikesBikes

Is it though? Halifax is as car dominated as every other city on the continent, more or less. In its most recent budget, there seems to be more attention for electric vehicles than actually reducing VMT. At the provincial and federal levels too, the push is for electric cars, not no cars. If there is a place truly waging war on cars, I'd like to see it.

Guess I'm not out of this completely.

Couple comments:
1) In what way is Halifax giving more attention for electric vehicles? Is it planning to help private citizens buy electric cars? Providing free infrastructure like charging stations? Honest question (in good faith...) as I haven't seen anything about that. That sounds like a misuse of municipal funds, and I would not support it.

I have seen where they are budgeting for electric buses and electric ferries, but these vehicles will be for public transit, so I know that's not what you're referring to.

2) The entire world is pushing for the transition of cars from ICE to electric, not just Halifax, or Nova Scotia, or Canada. The whole world.

I don't think anybody on a governmental or corporate level is pushing for "no cars" at this point. I am curious, though, what a world with no cars would look like, as they've been such an integral part of life, on a personal and business level, for well over a hundred years.

Which leads me to a thought exercise (Note: this is a point where you can click on another thread if you don't want to read a chunk of long, rambling pontification):
We all know what life in the 1800s looked like... basically slower, and smaller. People lived in the small, walkable communities (because they were a necessity, not just a desire like today). There were trains, starting in the mid to late 1800s (depending on which part of the province you were in) where you could travel from town to town, but little infrastructure in between. Roads were crude for the most part, and largely impassable during the winter and early spring months. I was just reading about the old market in downtown Halifax in the late 1800s (at Bedford Row/Cheapside), and apparently many of the farmers had to travel through the night to get there in time to set up to sell their wares in the morning. Then take all day to travel back to their destination, which may not have even been as far as the Annapolis Valley, but the book I'm reading didn't go into detail).

How would a modern version of the 19th century (i.e. without cars) work out? Firstly, one would presume that most people would have to live in the city, and that city would have to be more compact, and have extensive transit options that are frequent and reliable. I can see that working, though it would suck if you don't like city life, or crowds. People would have to live closer to their workplaces, unless they had a type of job conducive to working from home. Good transit would help alleviate it as well. And bicycles, of course, if you had more time and the weather wasn't horrible.

For farmers and other people living in rural areas, it would be more difficult. A rail system would have to be built again, as most of it was torn up in the 20th century, which would be expensive. I suppose they could return to the use of oxcarts to get their wares to the trains as they did in the old days. Perhaps there could be special permission granted to farmers and other businesses to use electric trucks (once they are developed and made available to the public on a wide scale).

Not cars, but another necessary change would be reduction in other forms of travel that are wasteful and not good for the environment, like air travel, for example. There's no reason why people couldn't videoconference from their home office, so there should be no need for business travel. Flying to other countries for vacations would have to stop as it's unnecessary and wasteful. Perhaps the age of sail could make a return as a mode of travel that doesn't use fossil fuels or electricity. Companies would just have to give their employees more vacation time for the increased travel time (employees would be happy, employers wouldn't).

On a local level, people would have to reinvent their schedules, like there's no way to get little Johnny to his soccer practice and then drop little Susie off to her piano lessons on the other side of the city. But then communities would probably change as well, whereby you'd do whatever was offered in your neighbourhood, like they did 100 years ago. Maybe there would be less choices, but it would all be closer to home.

Maybe it wouldn't be such a bad thing, as life has become too fast anyhow and we've all but lost our sense of community. The big thing would be the expense to change over, and getting people to want to change. The lure of being able to jump in your car and drive to the Cabot Trail for the weekend, or zip to the valley for the day to pick up some fresh fruit and veggies in the summer (along with the hockey and soccer practices, etc), or just a comfortable, warm way to travel on those -15 days, or the 'just around freezing' days of ice, snow, slush and slop would be hard for most people to give up. I think.

There would also be an economic hit, as entire industries would be shut down, but this isn't the first time the world has dealt with this.

Just a few thoughts. I must say it's an interesting idea - a world without cars. Almost hard to imagine, but from what I'm reading here, it's the direction that we're heading in, or will be forced to at some point. That is, unless we all kill ourselves off in a nuclear holocaust beforehand - then none of this will matter anyhow.

[Good Baklava]

Originally Posted by OldDartmouthMark

In his mind (and I now assume this mindset is shared by many others), I couldn't possibly discuss this topic in good faith because I like cars, and therefore must automatically be on the 'wrong' side of the "war on the car". A persona non grata as such.

More like normal human being than persona non-grata? Do you really think I can always discuss cars and highways in good faith? I wouldn’t try to be an unbiased arbitrator, there’s always a benefit to declaring them for the sake of integrity.

[OldDartmouthMark]

Originally Posted by TheNovaScotian

Feels like a family barb-q sometimes...

Love the title you added.

I'll put my hand up to play the part of the crazy uncle that you can't get away from. Just make sure my burgers are cooked all the way through... I don't like me no medium rare burgers...

Originally Posted by TheNovaScotian

Cars were the weapon of choice during "modern planing" of the 60's in the war against the cities full of poor people. IMO

That's an interesting take that I don't think I've ever seen before - like cars were invented as some conspiracy (war?) for rich people to laud power over poor people. I don't think it works out if you really think about it, though.

Originally Posted by TheNovaScotian

Take Detroit for example, hollowed out by the same thing that made it boom.
Now all the money in Michigan is an hours drive down the road in Auburn Hills and the other suburbs around the city. Detroit didn't fail, the plan worked perfectly to Henry Fords design. Rich people out in the suburbs, poor people stuck in the cities next to the factories.

Is it though? I mean Detroit is a large midwestern city that was very industrial, the largest being the auto sector. Henry Ford didn't create Detroit, nor did he plan for its failure (he actually died in 1947 when Detroit's industries were just reaching their heyday, basking in the money they made from manufacturing war implements for WWII). Henry Ford was a vile human being, but he was largely responsible for modernizing the assembly line, and offered fair wages for a hellish day's work (by today's standards, but better than his contemporaries). In fact, many poorer people actually moved to Detroit to work in the industry to live a better life than they were already living (like working the fields in the southeast US for next to nothing).

Also, FWIW, the Model T and its production methods were designed to be able to offer a car that the 'poorer' people could afford. Improved production practices and efficiency actually allowed him to lower the price of a Model T as time passed, which allowed more people to buy them.

Detroit's failure, as well as many other cities that depended upon manufacturing plants, was more due to globalization, and the tendency of corporations to move their production to countries where it cost less to build (due mostly to lower wages, but also to the lack of substantial safety and environmental regulations). It's always cheaper to make stuff when you don't pay the workers much, and you don't care about their safety or their environment).

Originally Posted by TheNovaScotian

When analyzed in the grand view, Urban Planning is pretty insidious. Things like redlining, highway projects cutting through established neighborhoods or caveats about what ethnicity can move where, are all throughout its short history as a formal field of study. Urban Planning as a field of study generally started during the time of industrialists making factory towns where they wanted people to drink less and work harder. It's been a tool of the rich and powerful from the beginning and the car allowed the rich to run away from cities in record numbers.

I'm sure some of it was insidious as you describe, but don't forget the massive 'slum clearance' projects which happened across North America. Even though IMHO they ruined many a city (including Halifax), the impression I get is that they thought they were doing it for the common good - i.e. to get people out of unhealthy and unsafe living conditions into clean, new public housing (like Mulgrave Park and Uniacke Square). I think history shows us that it didn't turn out so well, but I don't think it was done with bad intentions.

Suburbs likewise were invented out of a sense of naiveté, but for the 'middle class' who could now afford to buy a car (which made it possible), not the rich and privileged (they could afford to live wherever they wanted, and certainly not in some preplanned neighbourhood with small houses and a little greenspace out back). The problem is that little thought was given as to the end state and the costs that would ensue. More of a typical government/planning blunder due to shortsighted thinking than some massive conspiracy to keep poor people down.

Originally Posted by TheNovaScotian

If you want a good example of how we went from walk-able communities to drive-able ones, open Google Maps, take a look at North End Halifax and just follow the Bedford Basin. You have a nice and tight grid built in the early 1900's slowly moving towards Fairview / Dutch Village with a looser gird then you hit Clayton Park. It starts to have those undulating connector roads between two highways. Everything from there is just offshoots of the feeder roads and quiet winding cul-de-sacs. New schools, more highways and infrastructure need to be built, service extended out to sparsely populated areas. Maximizing an inefficient and costly land-use pattern that drains public coffers more and more each year. As the most successful cities globally tend to not prescribe to this North American sensation.

I think what you're describing is how cities grew through the last 200 years, and it was largely based on what limitations people had to deal with. Look at Richmond - it was originally a suburb of Halifax (yes... a suburb) that was built around the sugar refinery, rail yards, ship yards, etc. There was also a textiles factory up on Robie (the old Piercy's building was the ground floor of the building, which had been largely destroyed during the Halifax Explosion). It would have been built with a tight grid because the lots were small and the houses were modest working-class buildings. You could fit more houses in a smaller space and that kept the price down. The people living there mostly worked in the area, though they could travel downtown on the horse-driven railroad and later the electric Birney cars.

Other communities formed independently and weren't part of Halifax at the time, but grew together as the city grew.

The sprawl you describe most certainly is a result of people having access to cars, but again it wasn't the rich moving there, it was the middle class, many of whom probably grew up in the poorer areas of the city and lived in crowded substandard housing - this was their chance to get out of that. The rich tended to live in their south end mansions, around other rich people (as tends to be the way these things work out).

It's always easy to look at past ideas with 20/20 hindsight. But when you're in the middle of things, it's not always easy to see how it's going to work out. I think the large, sprawling suburbs are quickly becoming a thing of the past, but time will tell if whatever we choose next will work out. Nobody invests a ton of time and money into something that they think will fail... nobody... but not everything works out as a complete 100% success, so today's great idea might just be tomorrow's failure. Your children's and grandchildren's generations will judge you for it.

Originally Posted by TheNovaScotian

North American planners, don't even know what a walk-able community is, partially due to being told to ensure parking is reliably available in every facet of "the city" for so long. Starved of resources because of the sprawl now most cities in NA have to accept whatever developers propose instead of demanding better.
If you want an example of how that works, take Inglis St. in the South End, it smells like raw sewage during the summer. After paying taxes for 200 years even before Halifax Water rates existed, those taxpayers have subsidized each expansion of Clayton Park all the way out to Larry Uteck. They've laid enough sewer-lines for what's there as well for expansion of those suburbs but homeowners in the heart of the city don't have that luxury. They have to live with the smell of raw sewage. Too cash strapped to make a proper fix they live with band-aid solutions and parking garages full of the shit.

I don't think that's how it works. I don't know what the cause of your sewer smell is, but this just sounds like a failure of the city engineering department, and your councilor for not putting the pressure on the department to identify the problem and come up with a solution. The city isn't bankrupt. It's completely re-doing the Cogswell area at considerable cost. I'm sure fixing your sewer smell would only be a tiny (perhaps negligible) fraction of that cost - but there has to be somebody pushing for change. It's fun to make the case that the building of the suburbs in the 1960s and 70s led to ignoring downtown sewer systems, but that's not a viable excuse today.

In terms of other infrastructure, don't forget that Bedford, Sackville, Dartmouth, etc., were once separate entities and built their own infrastructure on their own budgets, independent of whatever Halifax was doing. For my part, I worked for a brief period in the City of Dartmouth Engineering Department, before amalgamation, and my impression from what I saw was that it was run better than Halifax's. But none of Dartmouth's build out into the suburbs was ever funded by Halifax as it was a separate city. It makes one wonder why Dartmouth could build suburbs in the 1960s, 70s and 80s, and maintain a functional sewer system but Halifax couldn't?

Originally Posted by TheNovaScotian

So in short, the generation that loved cars might be the only ones who get the chance to, as the real costs are slowly being revealed.

I'm not seeing that happen. And it's been several generations who have loved cars (or at least used them), not just one (like every generation for the past 110+ years). I expect there to be cars on the road long after I'm dead and gone (though they will be battery-electric, or whatever the next big thing will be looming over the horizon).

Or maybe not. But from what I'm reading, almost everyone here would be happy to live in a world without cars, so maybe that's the direction in which we will head and there's actually nothing to lament about?

[OldDartmouthMark]

Originally Posted by Good Baklava

More like normal human being than persona non-grata? Do you really think I can always discuss cars and highways in good faith? I wouldn’t try to be an unbiased arbitrator, there’s always a benefit to declaring them for the sake of integrity.

Fair point, though I don't think anybody has ever referred to me as being "normal" before...

As you describe things, it actually sounds like the basis of good, interesting conversation vs the 'echo chamber' thing. I prefer the interesting side of things, so all's good on that front.

[OldDartmouthMark]

Originally Posted by Hali87

I understand the point of view "people will choose to live in neighbourhoods that fit their lifestyle and will choose to either own a car or not, depending on their preferences". In reality it's not this simple though - cost/affordability is a much more critical factor than I think a lot of people realize. Fewer and fewer people really have a choice, and in practice the only option available to a lot of people is to live without a car in an area that was inherently designed for people with cars. As the Peninsula becomes more expensive, this will happen more and more unless other neighbourhoods are designed to prioritize pedestrians (which, to be fair, is happening in many other areas if we zoom out from Larry Uteck).

To be clear, in no part of what I have written was I ever suggesting to "let them eat cake"... even if it may have sounded like that.

You are right, though, that options today are shrinking for most people, and it shouldn't be that way. Housing should be a right, not a luxury, but it seems to be slipping in the wrong direction to be sure.

It wasn't always that way, and I honestly hope and pray that things will get better in that regard. Today's first time buyers (without existing equity) should not have to take out 35-year mortgages just to be able to buy an overpriced home. Or pay jacked-up rents. It's just not right.

[LikesBikes]

Originally Posted by OldDartmouthMark

Guess I'm not out of this completely.
In what way is Halifax giving more attention for electric vehicles? Is it planning to help private citizens buy electric cars? Providing free infrastructure like charging stations? Honest question (in good faith...) as I haven't seen anything about that. That sounds like a misuse of municipal funds, and I would not support it.

I have seen where they are budgeting for electric buses and electric ferries, but these vehicles will be for public transit, so I know that's not what you're referring to.

According to this article, the installation of new electric vehicle chargers will occur as a result of the most recent budget.

https://globalnews.ca/news/8755574/h...udget-2022-23/

Originally Posted by OldDartmouthMark

2) The entire world is pushing for the transition of cars from ICE to electric, not just Halifax, or Nova Scotia, or Canada. The whole world.

I don't think anybody on a governmental or corporate level is pushing for "no cars" at this point.

I agree with this and would go further, saying no political party in Canada is even really pushing for fewer cars. This is why I find people claiming "war on cars" and such puzzling. Go to any Canadian city and the car is still dominant. There might be a couple of protected bike lanes and expanded sidewalks on a few downtown streets but generally, the streetscape is unchanged from what it's been for the past half-century. The only difference now is people are starting to realize all the costs of car-dominated cities, but yet nothing is really changing in the majority of cities.

I'll add that I don't think cars will or should ever be fully gotten rid of though.

[OliverD]

Originally Posted by OldDartmouthMark

Just a few thoughts. I must say it's an interesting idea - a world without cars. Almost hard to imagine, but from what I'm reading here, it's the direction that we're heading in, or will be forced to at some point. That is, unless we all kill ourselves off in a nuclear holocaust beforehand - then none of this will matter anyhow.

Unless we can invent teleportation, I don't think we're getting rid of cars in any sort of foreseeable future.

As with almost every debate, the extremes can mostly be ignored. Anyone who is slightly pragmatic realizes that we can't just get rid of cars in our cities en masse – certainly not the way they are built in their current form.

Since WWII, we have prioritized car travel over every other mode of transportation and that has had massive consequences. Now the pendulum is swinging slightly the other way and a lot of people are taking that as a "war on cars" - never mind that on the whole, cars are still given the most space, the most funding for their infrastructure, etc. by several orders of magnitude.

The war is not on cars, but rather on car dependence. Cars can still exist but our transportation framework needs to acknowledge that they are not the only option, nor should they be. And if that means slight inconvenience for drivers, so be it. Transit users, pedestrians, and cyclists have put up with massive inconveniences for decades and I really don't see how anyone can argue that levelling the playing field a bit is a bad thing.

[OldDartmouthMark]

Originally Posted by LikesBikes

According to this article, the installation of new electric vehicle chargers will occur as a result of the most recent budget.

https://globalnews.ca/news/8755574/h...udget-2022-23/

Thanks! There's not much detail in the article, but if it's only the installation of charging infrastructure, then I actually support it. Charging infrastructure helps to give confidence to those who might be inclined to ditch their fuel burning vehicles and make the transition to electric, which although not perfect, is a step in the right direction.

The question remains as to who will maintain the stations, and where does the profit go from the usage of these stations? Is HRM getting into the EV charging business?

Honestly, I think charging stations should be left to the private sector, as the city should be concentrating on running "city" things, but I do support their attempt to help kickstart the transition. Perhaps they could recoup some of their investment in coming years by selling off the stations to a private entity.

Originally Posted by LikesBikes

I agree with this and would go further, saying no political party in Canada is even really pushing for fewer cars. This is why I find people claiming "war on cars" and such puzzling. Go to any Canadian city and the car is still dominant. There might be a couple of protected bike lanes and expanded sidewalks on a few downtown streets but generally, the streetscape is unchanged from what it's been for the past half-century. The only difference now is people are starting to realize all the costs of car-dominated cities, but yet nothing is really changing in the majority of cities.

I'll add that I don't think cars will or should ever be fully gotten rid of though.

My comment about the 'war on cars' was that it is more of a philosophical stance than one actively being pursued by government.

Government is always focused on re-election and thus tends to keep its ear to the ground so that it can keep it's talking points "hip", or whatever you want to call it. So talking points, a few small visible projects with much hype to look like they're doing something, but no substantive action (as they also know that people who rely on cars probably make up the majority of the voters anyhow). I think they gamble that there's a sweet spot where they keep the most people happy, and they target that in the hopes of maintaining office in the next election.

But you also can't deny that there is always a rumbling, especially on forums like this one, about getting cars off the road. Like "make things as difficult as you can so people will leave their cars at home", etc. I agree it's probably more on the extreme side of things, but when a certain poster suggested that somewhere in my posting background I had indicated that I'm a "car guy" and that somehow taints my ability to be able to post reasonably, it brought back all that I recall reading in the past and had denied up to this point. So, I have to conclude that, at least in some circles, there is a 'war on the car'... and maybe rightly so, as change needs to happen - it always needs to happen or we stagnate. That said, a philosophical 'war on the car' also doesn't necessarily imply that said "war" is actually being won by the side that is waging it.

On a level of government actively waging a war against the car, I think you're right on many levels, but there's a lot of past momentum that needs to be countered for visible change to be seen. So just because we haven't seen much in past years doesn't necessarily mean that nothing will happen in the next 10 (though the glacial speed by which government works probably means that change will be seen in 30 or 40 years, rather than 10).