Have your eyes glazed over already? I'm hoping not.
In fact, I hope you will consider sharing this with your networks or speaking up through your organization about the following:
First – at a time when many of us are calling for an increase in City planning staff to work on AT issues, there are cuts instead.
We are about to lose a transportation planner position at the City that serves as a bridge between the planning department and public works. Given the City's commitment to integrating land use and transportation planning through
OurWinnipeg,
Complete Communities and the
Transportation Master Plan, this is a serious blow. We need more people who understand
Complete Streets, not fewer. As Winnipeg Free Press
columnist Dan Lett described the staffing cuts at the City, it's like cutting off an appendage to lose weight.
Second – the Osborne underpass, a serious gap left unaddressed in the first phase of the Southwest Rapid Transitway, is now being pushed back till 2019.
It was previously in the budget for 2.5 million in 2015 and another 2.5 million 2017. It is now slated at 2.5 million for 2019. For more details on this and other aspects of the capital budget, please see
Bike Winnipeg's written submission.
Finally, on a related note, the
U-Pass for students and transit is apparently not going ahead.
thanks,
Beth