TransLink is the best system in North America: US transit planner
Posted February 21, 2015 7:53 am.
This article is more than 5 years old.
VANCOUVER (NEWS1130) – There is no regional transit agency in North America that is better than TransLink, those strong words are coming from a Transportation Planner out of California.
Here in Vancouver, we have a tendency to want perfection from TransLink according to planner Jeffrey Tumlin who worked with the transit authority to create the Vancouver Regional Cycling Strategy.
He says voting no on the proposed .5 per cent sales tax to fund transit could be bad.
“As we are watching in Vancouver, there is a tendency to want the transportation agency to be better and where [it is] not perfect, an intrinsic want to punish the operator,” he explains.
“One thing that we have learned however is that the best thing to do to make your transit agency worse off is to de-fund them. That taking away money from them in order to demonstrate frustration only punishes the people who are reliant on the transportation system.”
Looking at all basic performance metrics, he says TransLink’s problems are far better managed than anywhere else.
He says people in Metro Vancouver need to be realistic and in order to get perfection, Translink needs more resources.
The mail-in ballot for the proposed transit tax will go out starting March 16th and needs to be returned by May 29th.
