Transportation, housing big issues in Richmond election
Posted October 9, 2018 5:00 am.
Last Updated October 18, 2018 11:49 am.
This article is more than 5 years old.
RICHMOND (NEWS 1130) – Richmond is our province’s fourth largest city and continues to grow. While it’s got plenty of history, the challenges of tomorrow will be in focus the civic election for this Metro Vancouver community.
The growth has brought challenges about where people can live affordably, and how they can make their way around and through the city.
“We need to see more housing supply and more creative housing solutions that meet the needs of growing families,” says Matt Pitcairn, the chief executive of the Richmond Chamber of Commerce.
“So make sure that we’re building the right kind of supply that will keep employees and [their] young families growing in Richmond. We also need to be mindful of the added pressure that puts on our existing infrastructure, and make sure we have the capacity to move goods and people efficiently throughout our community and in and out of our community.”
On that issue of transportation, the clog around the Massey Tunnel remains a headache.
Despite the province cancelling plans to build a massive 10-lane bridge, Pitcairn’s preference would be for a new council to press for another look at that option.
“From a timing perspective, the quickest solution would be to move forward with the bridge,” says Pitcairn. “If they decide to look at a tunnel solution instead, we’ll have to start the whole environmental review and the public consultation phase over again, adding many, many years til the date where we’d actually see a new piece of infrastructure there.”
But Malcolm Brodie, the man seeking re-election as mayor, has consistently voiced reservations about that multi-billion dollar bridge.
“We see many problems with that,” Brodie says of a bridge on that scale. “We see damage, potential damage of the environmental sort to the river. We see agricultural land issues by them taking farmland for their transportation projects. We certainly see, in terms of the urban environment, we see many problems as well.”
Brodie faces five others in the mayor race.
Thirty people are vying for eight council spots. Some are running under party banners: the Richmond Community Coalition, Richmond First, RITE and Richmond Citizens.
Another issue sure to be on voters minds is the ongoing debate over mega mansions on the Agricultural Land Reserve.
At the school board level, as in other cities, the tension over the province’s Sexual Orientation and Gender Identity curriculum promises to be an issue that will resonate with some voters — or at the very least, a number of candidates for trustee.
Twenty-six people are in the running for the seven school trustee positions.
