Hulk Horgan coming through

Good news for anyone in the transportation industry.

Short term, this is good for me. I live in Surrey and work in the tri-cities so saving $155 a month for the monthly pass is awesome.


We'll see what happens with the supposed mobility pricing though...

Yeah take the tolls off the bridges that affects some people and bring in a mobility tax that pisses off everyone with a car, great way to get the Liberals in power again if they do that.

I live in Mission so hopefully the new taxes will only be in the GVRD since I no longer live in it.

The funny thing is the mobility tax will effect all the losers who voted NDP strictly on the basis of removing the tolls the most.

They should've gone with the Walmart pricing strategy. They price everything ridiculously low to move more units. I can't imagine that traffic and revenue wouldn't go up if they cut the tolls by 50%.

They're smart, look at what the promise of the toll removal did? Got them in power, they swept all of Surrey because of it.

Well lets look at some other taxes:

They tax small business owners on the money they make, then they tax the employees of those small business on their income, and then whatever remains of that money people get to live off gets converted to property tax, GST & PST, or whatever other bullshit taxes and fees the government can dream up. A single car can get taxed 5+ times in it's lifetime. You pay taxes on food, you pay taxes on clothes, you pay taxes on taxes. You pay fees for using government services, you pay for your drivers license, you pay for your passport.

So fuck it, bring on another one.



The amount of money our government gets here in BC is disproportionate to other markets similar to ours.

For example AB government collects only 42 billion from all it's income sources.

BC collects 47 billion.

While that 5 billion dollar gap may not sound like much, it basically amounts to ~$1200 per person (irrelevant of age). That means a family of 4 (2 kids, 2 parents) pays almost 5000 dollars a year more in taxes compared to those directly to the east of us.

On top of this with that 42 billion dollar budget AB manages to save money every year and run a surplus. Here in BC our government generally doesn't do that.

It appears that our government is just as much a failure a managing money as most of it's citizens are, the same ones who complain about not being able to afford a place to live here, and continue to eat out at restaurants 5+ times a week.

Forget the racists, sexists, homophobes, and all those other disgusting things going on right now.

As a capitalist, I'm most disgusted by how far western culture is slipping in regards to handling money.

It used to be that advances in technology would spur people like farmers to go get an education and aspire to be more. Now we artificially slow the advances of technology and robots to preserve jobs. That's whats wrong with this society, instead of striving for more everyone strives for equilibrium.

Maple ridge is meh, a lot better than it was a decade ago, but what was nice about the toll bridge is that it kept out Langley n Surrey trash :/

worried about trashes from a neighbouring city in your local store, just shop online

agreed about changes needed
but they came way too fast

either way, i'm not ready for ice bombs 3.0

I kind of look at tolling in the same light as "harm reduction measures". With harm reduction measures, of course I don't agree on principle that those programs use taxpayer money to provide addicts with a place to shoot up, and provide them with free needles. But I still support these harm reduction measures because you know the addicts problem isn't gonna go away, and proceeding with these measures is the most practical and cost effective way to control the situation.

With tolling, the idea is exactly the same. On princple, I 100% agree that we already pay taxes that should specifically be used for things like roads and infrastructure. But the realistic and unchanging fact is, governments are hugely cost inefficient. They can't effectively trim enough fat off to properly fund our roads and infrastructure. So that makes tolling the next best and most practical idea.

Another benefit with tolling is -- it acts as an effective incentive / deterrent to influence people's driving habits, and that makes it a very effective (traffic) volume control tool. When Port Man was newly reconstructed, I remember reading that some traffic pattern study said the bridge will revert back to the same gridlock levels as before in a mere 5 years if no (vehicle) volume control measure -- ie. tolls -- are put in place. Now guess what? In a few years, that gridlock is gonna come back.

nothing is "FREE" forever
something might come up later

lol NDP going to sink the economy just like the old days. They are pretty much shoving the debt into a drawer and closing their eyes and hope it'll go away. Coupled that with upcoming BC ferry fare freezes + $10 daycare + union wage increases and at this rate of debt accumulation they will have to increase the PST or other taxes or otherwise get downgraded by the credit agencies.

Luckily there's a good chance the Green party won't support them and the party will collapse and forced into a re-election.

really?
Coming from a guy who lives in East Van?!
How is that $1800/month, 600 square foot basement suite going for you?
How many times a week do you have to fight with your neighbours over a parking spot?

:lol

You're are ignorant of anything east of Boundary rd.
This is why no one cares about your opinion.

How is Dewdney Trunk doing these days?

https://i.cbc.ca/1.3203210.144054446...eless-camp.jpg

:troll:

You're the guy who says he doesn't wear a seat belt in a cab because you feel a sense of trust with cab drivers. Your opinion hardly matters.

GRVD. Rest of BC would not stand for it.

The cost of getting rid of tolls when the infrastructure and management company is already in place baffles my tax paying money.

So if I drive down to LA once a year I'm gonna get effed by mobility pricing?

:rukidding:

I assume that they're going to model the mobility pricing like they did for downtown London.

Worked as a delivery driver in Langley for 5 years. Outside of a handful of pockets I'll take east van any day over gangley. The downtown area is as bad as whalley most days. Also have never seen such a concentration of teenage mothers in my life as the downtown and surrounding areas of Langley lol..

Not to mention the cluster fuck that is the entire 200th/fraser hwy cooridor. Takes you as long to get from the freeway to 56th then it does from 200th to Burnaby.

So what happens to all those treo employees? That huge building they built near Ikea a few years ago?

Just wait till you start paying mobility pricing. Then you will look back and argue tolling isn't so bad.

B.C. taxes are near exact to alberta. We collect 47 billion from 4.65 million people. Alberta collects 42 billion from 4.14 million people. You missed an important part of the equation.

Wait people are renting a 600 sqft basement for $1800. I'm barely asking half of that. Unfurnished :okay: