VALTAC Campaign truck

At Douglas Park this afternoon, VALTAC launched their now rolling billboard as part of the campaign to get serious attention paid to the potential for reopening the old BCER Interurban line for passengers. The line was closed to all but freight traffic in 1954, but the right of way remains in provincial ownership. Southern Railway of BC operates a few freight trains each week, and part of the route is also used by CN and CP to get trains from their mainlines to Deltaport at Roberts Bank. But the right to run passengers trains was specified in the SRY lease as being retained by BC.

Other cities have utilised existing freight railways to improve transit service - even Ottawa! It is in fact quite common in Europe. And a trial project would not be hard to do. In Surrey the Heritage Railway Society is proposing to run an old interurban car with a fuel cell in what used to be the “express” (freight) car behind to provide power, as while the hydro wires are still in place the old trolley wire was taken down immediately after passenger service ceased. The cost of a pilot program would be a tiny fraction of the $3bn the province is proposing to spend upgrading the original Expo Skytrain - and of course much less than the road oriented “Gateway”.

The province’s lack of interest in even trying out such a system is quite at odds with its current attempts to make itself look “green” as its current transportation plan for the Valley (doubling the size of the freeway to the GVRD border) will only increase traffic and greenhouse gas emissions (something Kevin Falcon and Gordon Campbell try to deny - very unconvincingly. No-one thinks that this would solve all the region’s problems - but it would certainly be a step int he right direction for a change.

The event was ill attended and not well covered by the media. However I was interviewed by Sing Tao Daily who do seem to treat local news more seriously than some of the mainstream outlets.

I found this (and continue to find it) humourous in a not so classy kind of way.

Anybody know what’s up with this? It’s in different odd places around my neighbourhood, and it’s been there since I moved onto the street in 2004.

My office was still in the dark today. So I had a work-from-home day. This is what I did when I took a break from spreadsheets.

Is it wrong of me to be hopeful that the BC Hydro’s Estimated On Time for my office of 8:00 AM on Thursday is accurate?

I’m Lori K. I’ve lived in Vancouver for almost 5 years. The photo above was taken of me about half an hour ago. Today is my 34th birthday. This photo and this post is the first of 365 posts I will make here at Vancouver Metblogs.

I decided that I would document the 35th year of my life by participating in Project 365. In a nutshell, I’ll be posting a photo and perhaps a little commentary a day for a year. Since I live in Vancouver, and I’m taking/posting photos every day, the bulk of the photos will be about and of things in Vancouver. Hence, Vancouver Metblogs is a good fit.

Each week will have a different theme and one photo a week will be dedicated to that theme.

This week’s theme - July 13 – July 19 – Shoes

On the 13th day of every month I will post a photo of me. This is to document how I change over the course of year. I’ll try to make this photo of me as interesting as I can possibly make a photo of me interesting.

Thanks to Jeffery and Vancouver. See you all tomorrow!

Photo by Kris Krüg

It’s BC Superweek, the fastest 10 days in cycling. This weekend is the 3-day Tour de Delta, Next weekend is the 3-day Tour de White Rock, and in between are the legendary Tour de Gastown and the stylish Giro di Burnaby criteriums.
The riders involved are among the fastest on the continent, including past riders in the Tour de France like Chris Horner, and the racing action is brilliant. Drop by one of the events and have some fun.

If you want to watch for your humble servant for some reason, I’ll be driving in the support caravan at Delta and filming bits of Gastown for fun.

CP photo

From June 12 to July 6, the CP Spirit of 150 Rail Tour will visit 33 communities in the Kootenays, the Rockies, the Shuswap, Kamloops, the Fraser Canyon and Vancouver as part of the year-long BC150 celebration.

The CP Spirit of 150 Rail Tour is co-sponsored by Canadian Pacific, which is operating, staffing and maintaining the train. The train includes the vintage Empress 2816 steam locomotive and support cars, two vintage passenger coaches, a vintage business car, a heritage baggage car converted into a travelling museum and a vintage stage car.

The museum car features a selection of artifacts from the “Stories of you, me and BC,” a major exhibition at the Royal British Columbia Museum.

The stage car features the sound of British Columbia, with a live band and stage show by The Motherlode. Visitors can enjoy and interact with costumed performers depicting some of B.C.’s most entertaining and notorious historical figures.

June 26
Mission: West Coast Express Station, 33200 N. Railway Avenue (Between Home and Welton Street) 12:45 to 3:45 p.m.
Abbotsford: Gladys Avenue (extension of Highway #11) and George Ferguson Way/W. Railway Street. 5:30 to 9:30 p.m.

June 27
Maple Ridge: North Mainline Track (Across from the Billy Minor Pub, 22355 River Road) 9:45 to 11:45 a.m.
Pitt Meadows: West Coast Express Station, 12258 Harris Road. 12:30 to 2:30 p.m.

June 29

Port Moody: West Coast Express Station (West end parking lot, corner of Moody and Spring Street) 12 to 4 p.m.

June 30

Langley: Production Way, between 200th Street and Fraser Highway 2 to 4 p.m.

July 1 – Canada Day

Surrey: Cloverdale Village Square, Highway #10 (56th Avenue) and 176A Street (Rear Parking Lot) 10 to 4 p.m.

July 4

New Westminster: Advance Parking Lot, east of Westminster Quay, corner of Begbie and Front Street. 10 to 2 p.m.

July 5

West Vancouver: Ambleside Park, Marine Drive and 13th Street 10 to 2 p.m.

July 6

Vancouver: Rocky Mountaineer Station, 1755 Cottrell Street. 10 to 2 p.m.

for places outside the Vancouver region see the CP web page

The recent warm weather has melted the snow pack and started the “spring freshet”. The water in the river rises and cleans off all the logs and other debris from the banks, which then gets swept out to sea. Or, in this case into Canoe Pass which is one of the outlets of the delta. The current piles the debris up against the bridge, and the rise and fall of the tides does not always dislodge the longer trees. So the tugs are called. The link above takes you to a video of the Canoe Pass Renegade finishing off the remains of a large snag last weekend.

Big time bloggers, Heather Armstrong and Maggie Mason, are in town for VidFest this weekend. And they are scheduling a meet-and-greet over at Granville Island tomorrow from 5 to 7 pm. Here are those details:

Dockside Brewing Company
behind the Granville Island Hotel
1253 Johnston Street
Granville Island, Vancouver B.C.V6h 3R9

I’m going to hop on the Aquabus and take a ride over to Granville Island right after work. I’m not exactly sure what I’ll say yet, and I’m actually nervous at the thought of meeting them. I know, that’s silly, but it’s true. While I’m not a mommy blogger at all, I read both bloggers’ sites every day. And I really do like Heather’s photos.

From John Hodgman’s blog [taome]:

I CAN UNDERSTAND how I might forget that Vancouver will be the site of the Winter Olympics (a sporting event) in 2010.

BUT TO FORGET that its mascot is a Sasquatch? SHAME ON ME.

ACTUALLY, “QUATCHI” is one of three mascots for the Vancouver Olympics, all of which are either MYTHOLOGICAL or CRYPTOZOOLOGICAL, because

CANADA IS PERFECT.

That is all.

(AND, PLUS: even the mascots have a mascot. FINALLY)

Since John Hodgman is well regarded as an expert on everything, including all things crypto-zoological and hobo matters, it could well be true that he is right and Canada is perfect. 

Walking around the seawall last night after work I remembered how much I really love living in Vancouver.  Sure there are problems, but I think for the most part we have it good here and we’re too quick to be cynical about what we do have.  It’s easy to make a list of thing of things wrong with Vancouver, but working with tourists and new arrivals to Canada every day has been reminding me just how much we take for granted here.