The costs are too high — the benefits too few
What the so-called experts won’t tell you about the Parkway option.
There are many reasons it doesn’t make sense to turn our priceless greenways and parks into roads. Here, in no particular order, is a growing list of some of them.
- It is undemocratic; the people have consistently voted down the Parkway
- There are other options that get us moving but don’t destroy our greenspace
- The Parkway doesn’t get us from where we are to where we want to go
- We have other City spending priorities for road quality (our existing roads are a mess!)
- We have other City spending priorities for road safety
- We have other City spending priorities in general
- Natural Beauty and Greenspaces are our number one competitive advantage
- Greenspaces and trails consistently top citizens’ surveys for recreational improvements
- The Parkway will not eliminate “cut through” traffic
- The Parkway is NOT critical to meeting our transportation needs
- Personal and government debt is at crisis levels. Can we really afford this?
- It will increase flooding risk
- It will further harm the downtown business area
- We lose even more parkland (over 33% of Northend greenspace)
- Do we really want to jeopardise our good credit standing?
- While we have roads, we will have NO trails
- Our kids are disconnected from nature
- We have a massive weight problem—this isn’t going to help
- We need safe transportation alternatives
- Greenspace brings value to communities
- Do we really need more lights on North-South Roads?
- Our greenways are a rare treasure
- Cars before people is backward thinking
- Our lives are already too fast
- Trails connect families
- It costs nothing to use a trail—everyone benefits
- The Parkway is NOT critical to meeting our transportation needs
- A sidewalk is not a trail
- Development costs will NOT cover Parkway costs
- Development plans demand we connect to downtown not bypass it with the Parkway
- This has not been a fair and objective process
We have options that improve our roads AND preserve our priceless greenspaces and parks. They just don’t fit the preconceived (and in our opinion outdated) ideas that hold sway at City Hall.
We would like to write essays on each of these reasons, unfortunately, no one is handing us over a million dollars to work on this and we have families and day jobs. The limited time and energy we do have focuses on rebutting city hall positions within the official review process. We will do what we can. In the meantime, if you have reasons of your own, e-mail them to us.
