2020-DNV-Plan
DNV's 2020 Transportation Workshop and Implementation plan
On November 9th 2020, District of North Vancouver (DNV) council held its annual workshop on Transportation. In the workshop, staff provided an update and recommendations for major projects, to get feedback and guidance from Council. This information is used by council when setting the annual budget and staff for it's work planning. Workshops also allow limited public input, but only if time permits.
First Some History
At the 2019 transportation workshop, staff presented progress on bike infrastructure and recommended that council invest in a program to build a network and to develop a prioritized plan. Just prior to this HUB North Shore's delegation to Council had presented our goals which recommended completion of three prioritized bike route (coordinated between the municipalities). Guidance from the previous councils had been to link the three DNV town centres (Lynn Valley, Lynn Creek, Lions Gate Village). We requested they also include connections to the bridges and West Van. At the 2019 workshop, council endorsed this plan.
Back to Today
At the 2020 workshop, staff submitted several reports ([Reports] (p75-81), [Video of Staff presentation and council questions (starts around 2 hours in))]. In summary they presented a "10 year vision" for "Cycling Priority Routes".
We had reviewed the plan with staff and had 2 main concerns: (see HUB's submission to Council)
- We felt that some of the projects planned for the next couple of years were much lower priority than other projects that were five or more years away.
- The plan did not include the Town Centres, as infrastructure in these areas is (re)development driven. This would result in very significant gaps that could take years to fill.
Councillors Bond and Back brought up these two issues, and council also found time for HUB North Shore Chair, Don Piercy, to share our concerns. Mayor Little also mentioned that, for the first time, active transportation represents over 50% of the entire transportation budget, and that this was necessary to address the deficit that had accumulated over the years. Generally, council was very supportive, though naturally concerned about the need to get 9.7M$ of the 17.7M$ for 2021 from other organizations (TransLink, Metro Van, BC & Fed Govt, ...).
Excellent Progress
In summary, HUB is happy with DNV plan. We may not agree with some of the priorities, and have concerns about gaps, but overall council and staff are committed to funding and building a network of bikeways, most of which will be AAA (comfortable for most people). This is both a huge investment and significant step forward. It won't happen overnight and it won't be perfect, but compared to five years ago when much of the new bike infrastructure were just fragments built as opportunistic side-effects of other projects, this represents excellent progress.