The Livable Blog

Stéphane Dion of the federal Liberals has either released his Green Gateway plan without reading it, or qualified for the final round for champion of greenwash.

Choosing Earth Overshoot Day for his announcement that millions more will be shoveled towards ill-defined elements of Gateway, apparently including the South Fraser Freeway and perhaps the Highway 1 freeway expansion, is what raises it into championship territory. His plan to "Green Gateway" includes the assertion that increasing the volume of cars and trucks is sustainable if the volume of transit increases too:

"An increase in the volume of cars and trucks on our roads is only sustainable if we encourage more people to use public transit."

The fact is that freeway expansion and public transit expansion would likely increase GHG emissions faster than freeway expansion alone; some transit would almost certainly be commuter transit to park and ride lots which feeds automobile dependent sprawl. Transit to town centers does not feed sprawl in the same way. The $8 billion for transit seems to be just a rehash of what he has been promising for months.

It is worth noting the reducing the distances cars and trucks travel is essential to meeting BC and Canada's GHG reduction goals.

Perhaps Dion made it clear in his spoken comments that none of this 'Green Gateway' money will go to urban freeway expansion, and he may have just missed the content of the report due to his busy campaign schedule. But to me, it looks like championship level greenwashing. The links for both the media release and the report are below. If anyone has clarification on what Dion said about this, please post it as a comment below.

Build More Public Transit

Public Transit is an essential component of the Liberal 10-year $70 billion plan for infrastructure. An increase in the volume of cars and trucks on our roads is only sustainable if we encourage more people to use public transit. Therefore, Canada’s Liberals will invest at least $8 billion nationally for a National Transit Strategy that will enable our cities to expand their transit systems and green their transit fleets. In the Lower Mainland, a key Gateway corridor, this funding will help green the Gateway by supporting important projects like the Evergreen line in the North-East sector which deserves a much stronger federal partner. Canada’s Liberals would put an end to the stalling on public transportation and start working with communities to develop and deliver these key transportation priorities.

GG plan http://www.teambc.ca/electionsite/wp-content/uploads/2008/09/green-gateway.pdf

Media release http://www.teambc.ca/2008/09/23/dion-announces-green-gateway-strategy-for-british-columbia/