Mayor's Report - October 2009

Development of TransLink's 10-Year Plan has involved research on funding sources, development of a new financial model, and comprehensive analysis of existing and required transportation services and investments. As reported in June, development of TransLink's 10-Year Plan involved considerable public consultation.

Projections of capital and operating costs reveal an annual funding gap of $450 million per year in order to achieve the goals of Transport 2040, the Regional Growth Strategy and the Provincial Transit Plan. However, the various funding sources available to TransLink under Provincial Legislation are insufficient to address the identified funding shortfall. As a consequence, sustainable funding for TransLink is the current focus of debate with the Province.

The TransLink Board of Directors has presented the Mayors' Council on Regional Transportation with two options, referred to as Supplemental Plans, for funding transit and transportation in the Metro Vancouver region:

Should the Mayors' Council not approve one of the above two options, then the default Base Plan would result in drastic funding cuts to transit and transportation in the region. The forced rationalization of service under the Base Plan might improve TransLink's "productivity", but at too high a cost of disruption to the region and destruction of transit customer loyalty. For these reasons the Base Plan option was not endorsed by the Regional Transportation Commissioner, Martin Crilly, and in my view would be an irresponsible consequence of "doing nothing".

On October 23^rd the Mayors' Council will have to make a decision, and I believe that the Mayors' Council will opt to stabilize funding while continuing to pursue sustainable funding for transit and transportation from the Province of British Columbia.

UPDATE: On October 23^rd the Mayors' Council voted 17 to 3 (or 98 to 16 votes weighted by population) in favour of the "Funding Stabilization" option. The Burnaby, Port Moody and New Westminster representatives voted against the motion for funding stabilization.

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