have fun all you people that love to go downtown :)

It will be payed parking till 2 am (downtown core).

basterd lol

really? The same bums are still there..

bums moving to richmond doesn't really count.

I would much rather the city not kick the bums out of DTES for the olympics and just have them stay put where they are.I vote NOT to kick the bums out of DTES,cuase if you kick them out,where would they go......right into where we live.

It makes more sense for them to stay there and not wonder into our neighborhoods and turn it upside down and crime ridden,then decide to stay permanately due to a potential goldmine of crime they can have.

I think the best idea for the bums is,to ship them to Alberta,cause this is exactly what the Premiere of Alberta did in preperation for the 1988 Calgary olympics,he gave them all a one way ticket to B.C.

^

lol that'd be pretty brutal, ALberta will fucking bitch flip

:haha::haha:

Where did u get the facts about Canada beginning to recognize foreign education credentials?

All we would be doing is just returning the "favour".

We should also send some to Montreal too.

Of course parking costs are going to increase...the city needs to pay for the upkeep of the Bloedel Conservatory and the Stanley Park Petting Zoo. Oh, waitaminnit.......

Wow so people that drive downtown to work minimum wage jobs would basically earn like $1.xx per hour after the income tax?
WTF imagine working a 6 hour shift from 4pm to 10pm and only go home with $10 and change in your pocket! :2finger:

Driving is a luxury and paying for parking is an added cost. The downtown core has a good transportation system with the skytrain connecting DT to many of the neighbouring cities. If you can't afford to park, don't drive DT.
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^ This. I take transit whenever I go down.

i read it in the 24hrs they're going to start assisting those w/ foreign credentials to get them certified and accepted in canada.

regarding parking....i'm just waiting to see the day it catches up w/ the minimum wage :haha:

There are some jobs like working at restaurants that close late in which the Skytrain already shuts down at like around midnight, what is it 1am on the weekend? Weak!
A cab ride home would cost even more than paying for parking!

That's all untrue. They stay there cause its easy access to drugs. Disperse them and many will cleanup their habit, the truly homeless (ie those with mental problems) will always be a problem.

Just so you know,junkies take their habit with them,where ever they go,the dealers will follow.

Well if they are working at minimum wage jobs downtown and do not live downtown, then maybe they should not be working there at all (find a job closer to home), or move there.

You, a business owner should understand this. It would be like me complaining that your food prices are too high, and you should lower it so I can eat there. You would just tell me to eat somewhere else. Well either that or you can actually give me like 50% off or something, that would be good too :)

The hardcore will always find a way to feed their habit, yet they represent a low number of the junkies. Most junkies do it cause its easy, make it hard and they'll stop. Its proven, read some studies.

Studies show this,studies show that,I don't give a fuck what studies say,so until you actually have some realworld experience and have a serious drug problem where you live,don't go around talking like you actually know something about this subject.Most junkies do it cause they have to,it's called a fucking addiction,it takes over their lives,they can't just "quit" like that.I have far more experience on dealing with and know what kind of behavior drug addicts have than you ever will.

There's a reason why Vancouver is known as "the addicted city" to the rest of Canada.

studies also show that Vancouver is one of the top places to live,do you agree?

That's exactly what I'm saying. Basically the fact that the government are pulling this farce unnecessarily limits the options of many people seeking entry level jobs. Downtown, being that it has so many restaurants, clubs, retail stores in general provide many employment opportunities.

Now on an assumption basis that those businesses have trouble finding staff, would they need to put out incentives like higher wages? Which has a ripple effect of higher costs to products which directly trickles down to the consumer.

Oh and a random thought: Pretty soon it's going to be cheaper to just Valet and Tip than to park at the Meter for a few hours :haha:

I'm amazed by some of the stuff in this thread. Maybe I shouldn't be -- it's RS.

Tell me RS, who the FUCK makes minimum wage and drives every day to work?
Tell me, who the FUCK would drive downtown to net say, $3/h after tax but not $1/h after tax? Are you seriously suggesting that someone will spend half their net earnings on parking their automobile?
Best yet, who the FUCK makes minimum wage and can afford a car?

Let me answer:
... the same people who have cars bought for them. So, if you're one of these people, please STFU. Kindly. Go hit up mummy for money so you can afford stupid aftermarket HIDs and tacky blue LEDs.

Nobody making minimum wage downtown is driving downtown. If they "need" to drive for a min wage job, they're dumbasses (min wage jobs are NOT location dependent!).

I know where you're coming from and my points were purely speculation. The working class is just 1 angle, parking in general is a pain in the butt now. Everything you do in DT, be it shopping, dining, drinking, chilling, will cost that much more knowing that your meter is racking up $2 more per hour and THEN another $16 on top of that if you decide to stay from 8pm to 10pm. That's another meal right there!

I am not in that group of having rich parents buying me a car but you can't blame those that do for having that lifestyle. I only hate the people that don't cherish the value of it and rip it around town like retards. Why are you E-raging against ALL those people anyway?
I mean it's already a start that they even want to work for some of their money, however measly it might be. I once knew a busboy who worked at iCafe and drove a M5. I'm sure half his years wages wasn't enough to cover insurance let alone the payments!

haha, this was sunday for me

quick drive to downtown, got stuck on smithe for 30mins as they blocked the whole section from seymour to hornby for some parade.
i felt bad for the traffic authority woman that was trying to direct traffic. she had absolutely no control nor knew how to dish it, nor knew how to handle it. ppl were following the rules of the road, allowing safe room between cars but she was pushing cars to be less than 6inchs bumper to bumper. on top of that, she was trying to direct foot traffic across the street. pedestrians were annoyed as she was getting pissed and was putting that stress onto the drivers and pedestrians. it was a complete shit fest and she wasnt helping. she was directing ppl to walk between cars yet she forced the car to move up so that there was less than 6inches between bumper to bumper (yeah, she was a smart one). the group of pedestrians that were standing there waiting to cross were rolling their eyes at her lack of ability.

i finally gave up, parked in some parkade blocks away, paid 2 bucks to park 30mins to go buy a $15 toque i happened to lose somewhere on saturday. took me 10mins to walk there, 3 mins to buy, and 10mins to walk back.

after jan 1 2010, they will probably jump that to what, 3 bucks for 30mins? this is because translink is raising the taxes on parking spots something like 8-21%, which means the owners of these parking lots will pass it onto the customer. Though translink is suppositely a seperate company, its all tied into the gov't as there are members on both boards. gezzz, maybe the gov't should examine why revenue is not covering costs. just because a vote to increase their salaries was ok'd years ago, doesnt mean that decision reflects the current economic standings. they are even doing job layoffs and cutting jobs, yet the ones sitting in the higher up positions are "safe".

everyone knows translink is doing a piss poor job, demanding more and more money to cover less and less services. the only thing growing are the higher up salaries, and not even the ones that are doing the work, their own employees.

Im trying not to be negative, but it just seems to me, they made a promise that they knew they would have trouble keeping (the olympics) and are using every means to cover its costs, and make bad decisions based on covering asses.

they are public servants, yet we are limited to who we "elect" as being the decision maker and the crew he/she hires.

To me, every single one of their decisions is counter productive.

And if the city offered free parking, or decreased parking rates, would you then tell your staff "hey guys, its cheaper parking so you are all getting a pay cut" and then proceed to slash your food prices like crazy Eddie?

Kindly shutup.

Studies are better than one person's deluded experience. If we assumed all homeless are like 1 hardcore junkie prostitute in the DTES we'd be very wrong. Only 10% of homeless are hardcore addicts and/or mentally ill, the rest are either in bad situations and lazy.