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TEA & TWO SLICES: On Asking Really Good Questions And Great Editorial Threesomes

by Sean Orr | No justice without justice: Jails don’t keep people out of jail by Edwards, Gibbs, and McIsaac. Either this is some sort of law firm or it actually takes three different people to write a great editorial these days. I guess three heads are better that one.

Sigh: Another female B.C. Mountie alleges sexual assault while working. Am I the only one that reads into this a tone of exasperation?

Tying school grades to body weight goes too far. It’s true, though. I was a skinny bastard and still got straight Cees.

Remember when the Homes section in the Sun used to disguise their product placement with a sort of advertorial? Onni Group breathes new life into Evelyn. Yeah, me neither.

Is the Mayor’s pledge of 10,000 square feet of artist space too little, too late? That is a really good question.

The Courier agrees with my stand on the Liberal’s new attack ad: “Risky Dix sounds like an adult board game you’d play while doing shooters of Baja Rosa and standing around in your underwear”.

City Caucus is writing again? Skyrocketing increase in city fees overlooked – yet again. I thought they quit when their blatant bias was exposed. Oh well. I guess I’ll keep trying.

Forget about reviving traditional economies. That shit is for suckers: For Tsawwassen First Nation, development is the name of the game.

Bonus: Vancouver and the Insatiable Auto.

There is 1 comment

  1. Development’s not the problem: it’s the kind of development. I got quoted in that G&M article, and I’m worried some nuance was lost.

    Of course I don’t begrudge Chief Baird seeking to raise the living standards of her members. My concern is the amount of space given over to parking and the fact that there will be no residential space built on the mall site, so that all demand is expected to come from elsewhere. I don’t believe that single-use zones are an economically sustainable use of the land: walking to the store is better than driving to it.

    Interested people could see the following links for some alternative ways the site could be developed:
    * Century’s Southlands, just across the street http://www.corp.delta.bc.ca/assets/CPD/PDF/public_forum_presentation5_hodgins.pdf
    * Morgan Crossing in Surrey http://www.morgancrossing.ca/gallery/neighbourhood/
    * Daybreak near Salt Lake City, Utah http://www.daybreakutah.com/
    * One fictional idea for retrofitting a mall space, for inspiration:
    http://www.planetizen.com/node/46481

    If these sorts of mixed-use new urbanist designs have been considered and rejected, then great: I’d be fascinated to see the analysis that came to that conclusion.

    Finally, I liked the way Century/Southlands investigated ways to minimise transportation externalities in this document: http://www.imaginesouthlands.ca/sites/default/files/PDF/TDM-Options-For-Southlands-Mar2010.pdf I’d love to see the equivalent documents for Ivanhoe/TFN’s proposal.

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