The NDP is promising to overhaul regional transit planning in Greater Victoria, giving local mayors more control and including the E&N rail line in future strategies.
“We’re supporting a regional transit authority,” said Carole James, the incumbent candidate in Victoria-Beacon Hill and co-chairwoman of the NDP’s platform committee.
“We haven’t figured out whether the [Capital Regional District] is the existing structure to be in place, or whether you set up a separate authority that has mayors and elected people on it.”
If the NDP wins the May 14 provincial election, it will sit down with local mayors to find the best solution, James said.
Transit planning is currently handled by the Victoria Regional Transit Commission, made up of local members appointed by the provincial government.
Local mayors have long complained about working with B.C. Transit, the Crown corporation that provides regional bus service. The mayors have said B.C. Transit fails to properly consult with communities about service levels, property purchases and cost increases, and that more local control, through a different organization, is needed to plan the region’s transit needs.
A Liberal government review last August suggested new governance options, but didn’t select one.
“I think it’s been pretty clear, the examples we’ve had in the Capital Regional District, that B.C. Transit hasn’t been responsive to the challenges of this region,” James said.
“We have to have that authority closer. We want to make it effective. We believe we can use existing resources to do that. It’s just the model of what that looks like that is still the discussion that needs to occur.”
Esquimalt Mayor Barb Desjardins said she’s “certainly interested in having that dialogue” with a future government.
Desjardins said she has concerns about using the CRD to plan transit, because the regional government already has many responsibilities. She’d like another body that also looks at trains, buses, ferries and other transportation issues.
James said the NDP could also look at an “improved” Translink model similar to what is used in Metro Vancouver, but with more participation from mayors.
Vancouver-area mayors have complained they have little control over transportation decisions or priorities with Translink because an unelected nine-member board makes decisions.
Saanich Mayor Frank Leonard, one of the most vocal critics of B.C. Transit and the existing commission, said he’s anxious to see changes in governance and funding for transit, no matter who wins the election.
There are pressing problems with the models in Vancouver and Victoria, he said.
“Whoever is in government in June, this is going to be top of the agenda and then it’s going to ricochet across the province,” Leonard said.
