Monthly Meeting
April 4, 2011
Attendees:
- John Sankey, President
- Peter Brimacombe, Secretary
- Fred McLennan
- Gisèle Loiselle-Branch
- Jerry Beausoleil
Motion: To approve the March, 2011 minutes. Moved by Fred McLennan, seconded by John Sankey, carried.
Gisèle Loiselle-Branch: She has a list of e-mail contacts. How does the contact list work?
John Sankey: We have a contact list so that we can consult with the wider community. When the Board agrees we will send out e-mails to the list.
Jerry Beausoleil: When he presented his report on Hunt Club Road to the Planning Committee, there was criticism that the HCCO had not consulted with the wider community. He suggested that Board members create contact lists so that each member could contact community members and get their views on issues coming to the Board, as required. In order to be effective with city staff and councillors, it would be important to create large contact lists e.g. 500 to 800 people in total. Jerry found that many community members are not willing to have their names on a list where they do not know the person who controls the list. He suggested that each Board member create and control their own list. To date three Board members have taken this approach – Jerry has over 150 contacts on his own list.
John Sankey: Developments along Hunt Club Road will interfere with through traffic. Walkley Road is no longer an effective road for through traffic because of the 50 km/hour speed limit.
Fred McLennan: What is the problem? What are the facts? We need to have the traffic counts along Hunt Club Road.
John Sankey: Quintera residents don’t have access to their houses because Riverside is blocked from the railway tracks to Hunt Club Road. Fire and Emergency Services also depend on the ability of Hunt Club Road to move through traffic. There are two kinds of traffic counts: by observers and by traffic meters.
Jerry Beausoleil: He prepared a hand-out setting out our approach for dealing with “Hunt Club Road as a Priority Arterial”. He suggested that the key information that we want to develop include the following:
- what is the nature of the problem
- what are the defining factors, can we get supporting data, what does city staff think
- what has been done or is planned to be done
- what else can be done
- how should we proceed
- how should we measure success
There was agreement that Jerry should contact Councillor McRae and arrange a meeting to determine how she can help us with this issue.
John Sankey: OC Transpo has undertaken a major re-organization of existing bus routes. In our community it will re-route route 87 which will result in slower service. We can oppose the change or work to mitigate the damage by repeating our 2007 request to take out stops that are closer than required and by moving stops to where buses must stop anyway. Hopefully the new transit commission will listen more than OCTranspo did in the past.
Peter Brimacombe: The Board dealt with proposals to remove specific stops along route 87 in February 2007. They were defeated.
Motion: Whereas route 87 is the only bus available to two-thirds of our community of 13,000, and whereas the proposed re-routing of the 87 through the Mooney’s Bay community will add approximately 5 minutes to the travel time of all of us who use it, therefore be it resolved that the HCCO request OCTranspo to do everything it can to minimize this additional delay, and that it urgently examine all possible ways of reducing existing unnecessary delays on route 87. Moved by John Sankey, seconded by Jerry Beausoleil, carried.
John Sankey: At the meeting 5 February 2007, we passed the following motion and no action was taken at that time with regards to our concerns: That the HCCO request OC Transpo to examine all routes serving the Hunt Club Community with a view to consolidating bus stops that are within 200 metres of each other.
Next meeting: Monday May 2 at 19:30