first a possible increase on gasoline, now possibly more tolls? betch plox?

[TRDood]

The only problem with public transit is that it's dirty as fuck and too many crazy people.
Posted via RS Mobile

[Supafly]

I wouldnt mind paying the taxes and tolls if our roads were repaired efficiently and in a timely matter with quality materials.... with our roads (espescially on the westside), it needs to be torned up, repaved with some better reflective marking materials ...good god, I cannot see the darn lines in the rain....

[melloman]

I agree with Gridlock.

We are jumping too many lines to try and get ahead of much better cities. And I'm looking at my future in the GVRD and laughing at myself. In 3 years when I find myself ready to move out, where the hell am I going to go?

I won't beable to afford housing in Richmond. The housing I can afford is in Langley/Abbotsford (in 3 years it will probably be Chiliwack) making my trip take 3 hours longer, cost thousands more/year, and I'll be even poorer then.

I currently live in Burnaby, and work in Richmond. If I wanted to take public transportation, it would take roughly 2.5 hours to get to work, compared to my 35 minute commute by driving.

Driving is a privledge, I can agree. Which is why I pay $75/5 years for my license. Why I pay $3000/year for insurance which I will NEVER get back because I'm a competant driver. And when I do have something happen to me, I STILL have to pay a deductable (a vandalism claim still cost me $300 yet it was in no way my fault..) And now paying whatever the god damn gas tax is.. I do find myself donating ALOT for my "privledge."

I do not own a home, I live with ym parents. I can see what we pay in taxes/year.. and how every year those taxes go up. Yet I don't see a better quality of living. Funny.

[dinosaur]

It makes me crazy when people compare the lack of tolls here to other cities and countries.

The Lower Mainland/GVRD is not built like other cities. This obviously goes without saying, but we are spread out everywhere....up hills/mountains, into the valleys, close to the water, on small islands, etc.

People do not work where they live. It is rare to find someone who lives in Burnaby and works in Burnaby. Same is said for students. Not everyone has the luxury of going to UBC while living in Point Grey. We are a commuting region. When you have a commuting population, with people coming from all over the place, you can not expect public transit to reach everywhere! I lived in Delta and worked in Maple Ridge...I sat next to students at SFU who lived in Abbotsford.

Translink/Gov't needs to stop continually expanding to reach every possible area of the Lower Mainland. A vast majority of people have no option but to drive a car to get places.

We need to pick one! We can be adding bridges, re-building bridges, expanding roads and highways at the same time we are expanding and adding public transit. We can't afford to do both! Unless they plan to expand skytrain to surrey/langley/abbotsford and to Whiterock, Tsawwassen, Ladner, Steveston, etc. it can't be transit!

Ugh, I am so sick of all this shit. Everyday its another fucking toll, tax, fee, levy, rate hike, etc...all to live in the "best place on earth". If this is the case, we should start taxing the ocean, mountains, and air because we are all running out of blood for the gov't to suck.

Rambling rant over...

[cctw]

lol they haven't told you the best thing yet...HST on top of the tolls

[melloman]

Road tolls recommended for Metro

However, the report notes one drawback - none of these road-pricing schemes could be implemented in time to meet TransLink's 2013 needs.

Plenty to hate about TransLink's wishlist of taxes and fees

It includes higher gas taxes, higher transit fares, new bridge and tunnel tolls, new charges based on how far you drive, new vehicle registration fees, an employee tax and an attempt to capture some of the increased property value that new transit often creates.

The only thing missing is a tax on shoes, to capture anyone able to avoid the other taxes by walking to work.

And hey, best of all.. if we don't get any taxing going. Property owners will take the hit.
http://www.vancouversun.com/news/Met...420/story.html

[melloman]

http://www.translink.ca/~/media/docu...g_forward.ashx

And the commisioners notes:

http://www.translink.ca/~/media/docu...upplement.ashx

[Mr.HappySilp]

Originally Posted by dinosaur

It makes me crazy when people compare the lack of tolls here to other cities and countries.

The Lower Mainland/GVRD is not built like other cities. This obviously goes without saying, but we are spread out everywhere....up hills/mountains, into the valleys, close to the water, on small islands, etc.

People do not work where they live. It is rare to find someone who lives in Burnaby and works in Burnaby. Same is said for students. Not everyone has the luxury of going to UBC while living in Point Grey. We are a commuting region. When you have a commuting population, with people coming from all over the place, you can not expect public transit to reach everywhere! I lived in Delta and worked in Maple Ridge...I sat next to students at SFU who lived in Abbotsford.

Translink/Gov't needs to stop continually expanding to reach every possible area of the Lower Mainland. A vast majority of people have no option but to drive a car to get places.

We need to pick one! We can be adding bridges, re-building bridges, expanding roads and highways at the same time we are expanding and adding public transit. We can't afford to do both! Unless they plan to expand skytrain to surrey/langley/abbotsford and to Whiterock, Tsawwassen, Ladner, Steveston, etc. it can't be transit!

Ugh, I am so sick of all this shit. Everyday its another fucking toll, tax, fee, levy, rate hike, etc...all to live in the "best place on earth". If this is the case, we should start taxing the ocean, mountains, and air because we are all running out of blood for the gov't to suck.

Rambling rant over...

Just wait till the gov start putting parking meters everything including in resident streets and when the needed more funds they will put parking meters in your garuage and on your driveway.........

[Death2Theft]

UN agenda 21 is to bring the standard of living down.

Originally Posted by melloman

I agree with Gridlock.

I do not own a home, I live with ym parents. I can see what we pay in taxes/year.. and how every year those taxes go up. Yet I don't see a better quality of living. Funny.

[melloman]

^^ So I'm paying more for a shittier standard of living?...

[twitchyzero]

lol @ politicians should make 50-70k instead of adding taxes

[Ronin]

How does public transit here in Vancouver manage to be so fucking terrible yet cost so much?

[Tomu]

^exactly my thought and I think it's because of population and population density that makes public transit pretty unsuccessful here.

I always compare Vancouver to Taipei because well, I'm from Taipei and I have first hand experience there with Taipei MRT. Fare for Taipei MRT has not increased for the past 15 years and yet they still profit every year from just fare ALONE. You guys can google this if don't believe :P. Not to mention it's cost nearly 30 billion USD to build it...and they aren't bleeding us dry with taxes.

Anyways all these new "lines" and buses simply don't attract crowds like Hong Kong, Taipei or Tokyo so what does Translink do? they tax the shit out of us. I think Translink really need to examine what kind of city Vancouver is.

And just like what dinosaur said above, unless they connect all those places like White Rock, Abbotsford etc we can't have a real complete transit system...and even then would it receive the ridership it needs to sustain it?...

[falcon]

Originally Posted by RS_Pat

I think he was talking about Kevin Falcon...

Wait, you mean there's another falcon?


lol, thanks for clearing that up.....

[falcon]

Originally Posted by Slifer

What is a "betch plox"?

bitch please

[falcon]

We need Light Rail out to Abby/Mission/White Rock/ the valley. Skytrain is not the answer. Or something like germanys "s bahn" which is basically a train that runs with regularity like our skytrain does.

[Death2Theft]

Exactly, not to mention they want to price the average family out of single family homes and into high density condos at high density mass transit stations. It's all part of the plan stan.

Originally Posted by melloman

^^ So I'm paying more for a shittier standard of living?...

[Gridlock]

Originally Posted by melloman

I agree with Gridlock.

Well, its about damned time

[spyker]

Originally Posted by falcon

We need Light Rail out to Abby/Mission/White Rock/ the valley. Skytrain is not the answer. Or something like germanys "s bahn" which is basically a train that runs with regularity like our skytrain does.

There are alot of things we need,but I and many others are sick of paying for this type of shit.

[falcon]

Well whether you agree or not, it's what we need. The rail is already there, build some stations, buy some trains and we could at least have a basic system pretty quickly.

[melloman]

Originally Posted by falcon

We need Light Rail out to Abby/Mission/White Rock/ the valley. Skytrain is not the answer. Or something like germanys "s bahn" which is basically a train that runs with regularity like our skytrain does.

The Bahn.. I was in Estonia with a similar system of rail.. pretty much like we have from Granville Island to Science World, but it was their main way of transport from suburbs/country to the capital city.. (Country is 6hr drive diagnoally so not too big)

It could easily be done but that's not GREEN and clearly no one would then approve of that. We have to be GREEN and better then everybody else or we can't build it. Thus the Evergreen Line taking like 5 years to finally begin construction because no one wanted to pony up the RIDICULOUS amounts of money for it.

[tgill]

Originally Posted by Tomu

^exactly my thought and I think it's because of population and population density that makes public transit pretty unsuccessful here.

I always compare Vancouver to Taipei because well, I'm from Taipei and I have first hand experience there with Taipei MRT. Fare for Taipei MRT has not increased for the past 15 years and yet they still profit every year from just fare ALONE. You guys can google this if don't believe :P. Not to mention it's cost nearly 30 billion USD to build it...and they aren't bleeding us dry with taxes.

Anyways all these new "lines" and buses simply don't attract crowds like Hong Kong, Taipei or Tokyo so what does Translink do? they tax the shit out of us. I think Translink really need to examine what kind of city Vancouver is.

And just like what dinosaur said above, unless they connect all those places like White Rock, Abbotsford etc we can't have a real complete transit system...and even then would it receive the ridership it needs to sustain it?...

Just comparing area:
Metro Vancouver: 2,877.36 km2
Taipei: 271.7997 km2

Not to mention difference in labour, material, design standards, geographical constraints, and growth plans. Its pretty simple to understand the difference between Vancouver and most cities, and why it costs so much and is so difficult to provide transit.

Translink was so dry on cash the BC Govt cheaped on the Canada Line and went with the cheaper SNC-Lavlin bid. PPP operated transit, incompatible trains from the rest of the line, minimum number of trains needed, stations built to current capacity and most unable to expand for longer trains, etc...

[mikemhg]

MY mind is blown looking at some of the salaries of the top CEO, CFO, etc in the PUBLIC SECTOR! The CEO of BC Ferries has a $1,000,000 salary, some of the highest paid salaries in the province are at BC Ferries. BC fucking Ferries?! Are you kidding me? No wonder I'm paying $80 to take a ferry for 30 minutes with my car to the Sunshine Coast, and almost $200 to just visit Victoria with a vehicle. Can you fathom that you have to pay a quarter of a vacation to Mexico, just to take a car on a short ferry to the Capitol City of our province? Something is seriously missing here.

Mind fucking boggling. Instead of looking to tax us more, how about we drop some of these high end salaries, and look to implement cost savings from within these bloated Crown Corps?

My blood is boiling right now.

[Greenstoner]

offtopic but i went to renew my insurance yesterday

11 years accicdent free under my belt.

Reviewing my deductible.. not bad, 10 dollar discount here and there. That's cool.


BUT when i was reviewing my total, it was higher than what i was paying last year... look carefully again, yup, icbc increased the basic insurance rate by $90

great... im still paying more !!

[dbaz]

only road tolls i see that would work are highways. other than that tolling main roads is fucking ridiculous. all it will do is divert traffic to other roads effectively making them main roads in the future. would they then toll those as well, forcing people to once again find new routes?