Friday, August 12, 2011

More Drive-Thrus in Pedestrian Friendly Downtown Langley

One of the things that I don’t understand about the City of Langley is why they continue to allow drive-thrus in their downtown core and gateway areas. If you are trying to build a pedestrian-friendly core, building a drive-thru is not the way to go about it. The following are examples of drive-thrus that are in areas zoned as Downtown Commercial.

Fraser Highway at 201 A Street

Fraser Highway at 203rd Street

Fraser Highway at 206th Street
According to the Official Community Plan Downtown Commercial zoning “is intended to accommodate a broad range of retail, office and entertainment uses in addition to social, cultural and educational services and facilities and multiple family housing consistent with the pedestrian-oriented character of the downtown core.” There is nothing pedestrian-friendly about a drive-thru.

I was on the bus yesterday and noticed that a new coffee shop will be constructed with a drive-thru on Fraser Highway right next to downtown. While the area is zoned service commercial, it doesn’t seem to fit the character of the area with the recent development of two higher density residential complexes. Sometime I wonder if the City of Langley is compromising building a pedestrian-friendly downtown for the sake of any development.

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