Just thought I would link to a comment of mine cited today at Streetsblog about Ed Fay, the most selfish idiot commuter in New York City, as it turns out.

See it Here.

Has anyone else noticed that the Harper Conservatives appear to have abandonned their previous commitment to fixed election dates?

Am I just missing it, or is there no new fixed eleciton date?

You’ve lost Norm. It’s to go fishing, permanently.

In a city with parking restrictions on major commercial office development that is investing in a new LRT system with a downtown subway, why are we still talking about cash in lieu of parking?

The theory behind it is that businesses that don’t provide enough parking spaces for their customers will push the burden onto the city to provide it, and should pay accordingly. EXCEPT, we’re also trying to encourage people not to drive when it is unnecessary and build a more urban community. How do you square these goals with a policy of punishing businesses operating with fewer parking spaces?

Getting rid of this tax on urban form would help reducing the imbalance of commercial viability between suburban and urban businesses and further discourage badly designed urban sprawl. The current policy only encourages more parking lagoons to avoid an unreasonable city fee.

Council was right to rule as they did, because there is no reason a restaurant in a dense urban neighbourhood should have let alone be legally required to have more than 17 parking spaces. If the city can’t lose the revenue, consider a new fee, a tax on parking spaces themselves. This would better capture the externality of providing suburban inefficient road, sewer and utility infrastructure, and encourage businesses to locate and design their buildings to allow more of their customers to reach them by foot, bike, or transit.

TEAR IT DOWN?

Not surprising, really, but have a look at this.

It would seem that some of the bright ideamen and women of Detroit City Council would like to see this glorious and historic train station face EMERGENCY demolition. Even as $8bn was put forward in the 2009 budget for High Speed Rail. Even as Ontario and Quebec move closer to funding a Windsor-Quebec City HSR corridor that could and would presumably connect to Detroit, even as Michigan itself proposes a $3.5bn midwest HSR project.

WHAT, WHAT are they thinking?

Even if this building were never to be used as a rail station again. Unlikely, but even then, why would you destroy one of the finest examples of grand railway buildings in North America? Detroit is a sad sad state of affairs, it would seem. Even outside GM headquarters.

Just five years ago, I was a young naive first year student in POLI 211, Introduction to Comparative Politics. My professor, a former East German journalist, Dietlind Stolle, asked the class what they thought  equality should be mean. Was it equality of opportunity or equality in results?

The class overwhelmingly supported the former. My professor was taken aback.

Was my class simply a product of the highly successful times? Would this same result happen today at McGill? I wonder how I would have voted had I been an impressionable 18 year old political science major in 2009 rather than 5 years earlier.

Were we just drunk on economic growth, and has our expectation of government changed? I think it’s a question worth asking.

Recently, I had a Google alert come up for my riding name, “Nepean-Carleton” with this article in a local free weekly advertiser.

The article, published under the by line “SPECIAL TO THIS WEEK” appeared to be verbatim press release from the office of my Progressive Conservative MPP, Lisa MacLeod. In this piece, she argues against a minimum wage increase that became law on March 31st, 2009.

After sending a letter of compaint to the editor, they offered me the space to write a rebuttal, which they published the next week, available right here.

I’ve had another letter to the editor published in the Ottawa Citizen, you can read it here.

Essentially, it was a letter in support of an earlier letter to the editor encouraging OC Transpo and the STO to offer public transportation to Gatineau Park and other outdoor public amenities.

I felt I could add to the debate by describing the excellent service I experiences in Oslo, Norway, where they have a subway line that terminates above ground at their Olympic training grounds, making it very easy to access the immaculate parks that surround the city.

***

I agree with recent letter-writers that there should be excellent public transit links to Gatineau Park as well as other major parks, beaches, ski hills and leisure facilities.

Indeed, I would suggest going a step further by reducing car traffic within the park on its busiest days, when you find yourself cruising for parking spaces up and down the road and in the parking lots rather than enjoying the natural beauty of your surroundings.

We should provide parking at the base of Gatineau Park, then arrange a shuttle to each of the trails. It would provide a considerably better option than the current free-for-all.

If the National Capital Commission which is responsible for the park is looking for an excellent model, I would suggest they look to Oslo, Norway, where on a recent visit a friend and I were able to take one of the city’s subway lines to its terminus at the base of a glorious park, not dissimilar to Gatineau Park. No fuss, no muss. The service is particularly popular on Sundays when the shops close and residents take to the parks for some recreation.

Geoffrey Hall,
Ottawa

Two weeks ago, individuals and groups across Canada held small get-togethers for the Liberal Party of Canada. The event was called Liberal Helpings, and is part of the new grassroots effort being led by Rocco Rossi and others in the party to expand membership and increase involvement in the party.

Kate Townsend and I, not wanting to be left out, organized a little event of our own a day early at Goodenough College in Bloomsbury, West London, UK. The event was well attended with 37 guests, and even featured a private call from Michael Ignatieff.

Thanks to all those who attended this great event. We’ll be sure to organize more in the future!

All the photos from the event can be found here.

Had I told you this would be a headline in the auto business section even as recently as a year ago, you all would have said I was crazy.

The times they are a-changing.