Cape Horn Interchange

As part of the Highway 1 Expansion Project which is part of the Gateway Program, the province will be changing the current Cape Horn Interchange from this:

Current Cape Horn Interchange

To a Texas Style Stacked Interchange:

Future Cape Horn Interchange

While the future interchange is certainly an engineering marvel, I don't think people truly understand how much space interchanges like this take up. If you look at what happened at 200th St at Highway 1, when that interchange was redesigned to save space, about half-a-dozen businesses and a hotel fit in the old interchange foot print.

For the Cape Horn Interchange, I thought I'd map the old interchange's footprint to Granville Island. The new stacked interchange will use up all the space in the triangle.

Pretty shocking isn't it!

GHG Emissions per Capita

Canadians tend to think of ourselves as green. What we think of ourselves and what is reality are completely different. Looking at a table about green house gasses (GHG) emissions per capita, Canada is pretty much tied with the United States with GHG emissions at 22.6 tonnes per capita per year.

I always asked myself why we are so close to the US when we live in more compact and more urban settings than are American friends. According to Environment Canada, about 20% of GHG emissions are caused by the the oil, gas, and coal industries in Canada. If we removed these sources of GHG, we would be tided with New Zealand at 18.08 tonnes per capita. The UK produces 10.6 tonnes of GHG emissions per capita per year. Of course we have lots to do as transportation is the number one contributor to GHG emissions in Canada, but it is interesting to note that Canada's urban centers are masking the GHG emissions from oil and gas. Other oil producing nations like the United Arab Emirates produce 38.8 tonnes of GHG emissions per capita.

News Notes - Protecting the ALR

Last month, we published a report about threats to the Agricultural Land Reserve (ALR). This month, the Auditor-General's office released a report called "Audit of the Agricultural Land Commission". The Auditor-General found that the 5% of land in BC which is suitable agricultural lands is under threat because the Agricultural Land Commission (ALC) lacks "the current staffing resources and enforcement tools to support those policies" to protect the ALR.

The commission is challenged to effectively preserve agricultural land and encourage farming in British Columbia, specifically:
the commission has not determined that the boundaries of the ALR are accurate and include lands that are both capable of and suitable for agricultural use;
the commission has identified limitations in its ability to preserve agricultural land and encourage farming through the application process;
the commission is not sufficiently involved in proactive longterm land use planning with local governments to encourage farming on a broad basis;
and oversight of the decisions made by its “delegated authorities” needs strengthening to ensure that agricultural land is being preserved and farming encouraged.

The Auditor-General recommends that the ALC

-ensure that ALR boundaries are accurate and include land that is both capable of and suitable for agricultural use.
-seek government’s support to make changes that will allow it to more effectively -preserve agricultural land and encourage farming through the application process.
-engage in proactive long-term planning with local governments to encourage farming.
-work with Fraser-Fort George Regional District to address concerns it has with the District’s processes.
-work with the Oil and Gas Commission to develop an action plan to implement the recommendations of the 2009 audit.
-ensure that it has a sufficiently robust compliance and enforcement program.
-prioritize completion of the new database and finalize conversion of the original paper ALR maps into digitalized format.
-evaluate the collective impacts of its decisions on applications and its broader policy decisions.
-report publicly on the cumulative impacts of its decisions.

When I did research on the ALR in the South of Fraser, the biggest challenge I ran up against was that most of the information on the ALR is in paper form and isn't easily assessable. Also, I know that there are discrepancies with ALR boundaries and would support an accurate remapping of agricultural land within BC. Of course that requires the provincial government properly fund the ALC.

South Fraser OnTrax Announces 2010/2011 Meeting Schedule

With September upon us, South Fraser OnTrax kicks into full gear. To that end, we have posted our 2010/11 meeting schedule. We have some exciting guests lined up with details in the coming weeks. Please consider encouraging your friends to join us!

All Meetings:
Place: Township of Langley Civic Facility, 4th Floor
20338-65 Avenue, Langley
Time: 7:00pm - 9:00pm (Third Tuesday of the month)
Room: Yorkson Creek Meeting Room

Meeting Dates:
September 21st, 2010
October 19th, 2010
November 16th, 2010
January 18th, 2011
February 15th, 2011
March 15th, 2011
April 19th, 2011
May 17th, 2011
June 21st, 2011

Download a PDF of our meeting schedule