Pedestrian Zones in Downtown Victoria

There is an interesting discussion at Vibrant Victoria about a potential pedestrian only zone on Government Street.

The debate has heated up because of this article in the paper.

I would love to see some form of a public gathering place in the centre of the city, the concept of the agora. There was a move in the late 1960s and 70s to create pedestrian malls in many North American cities. I remember the creation of Granville Mall in Vancouver in 1974. I also remeber that by the early 1980s it had gone down market enough that I did not feel safe walking there. It was a failure as were many of them in North America.

I have seen examples that have worked well.

The Zeil in Frankfurt am Main is one that I know well and that looks like it works. It was created a pedestrian zone in 1972. The street was the core shopping street of Frankfurt for generations before World War 2. In the war almost all the building were destroyed and the rebuilt street is some of the most bland 1950s and 60s architecture there is. It pains me to say that because one of my uncles was one of the architects that designed these buildings.

Why does the Zeil work? Because it is a functioning mall. It is a serious and significant shopping area for the whole region. What was the road is now a street market. The restaurants spill out into the open.

In Whistler there is a functioning pedestrian zone in the upper village near to the Wizard Express chair. It was build that way and works well, but then this is a resort community and a lot of people are wandering around look for things to do.

I am not sure that closing Government Street would make a good pedestrian zone. There is no natural reason for local people to gather there, offices are not close and there is no shopping for Victorians. It is also oriented in such as way that for large parts of the day the buildings along the street shadow Government.

A Government Street pedestrian mall between Humboldt and Fort would serve the needs of the tourism trade, but is that enough to make it work?

We have two pedestrian zones in Victoria already. On is Market Square and the other is Bastion Square.

I love Market Square but I have almost no reason to every go there. The inner court yard would be a cool place to have an office, but is empty. A beautiful creation that simply does not have the vibrancy I wish it had.

Bastion Square on the other hand does attract people and seems to work for locals and tourists. Maybe what needs to be done is an expansion of the area. Step one could be a closure, some of the time, of Langley. Expand the market onto Langley and also allow restaurants to have outdoor seating.

In thinking about this I realize how much of a dead space the ground floor of the the Yates Street parkade. The city should consider some manner reconstruction along Yates and Langley to allow for retail spaces in the area.

The backside of the old courthouse (Maritime Museum) and the stairs up to the parkade is a problem area and needs more retail in the area to bring life to the back corner.

So you build up the pedestrian area in Bastion Square and can then look at closing Government between Fort and View. This would connect the Bay Centre Mall with Bastion Square.

Any thought of pedestrian zone needs to be welled thought before being embarked on.

Invasive Species

It is fundamentally horrific at the extent that invasive species are taking over so much of the uncultivated landscape in the CRD. I drove past some more nice parks that should be providing us with the quasi wild landscapes and are choked out with blackberries of English Ivy.

I know a lot of people would like to see a ban on all herbicides, but I think we should go out with Roundup and hit ALL the English Ivy in the region. Smash it back and then work to keep the areas clean of the invasive plants. We can not let it continue as it is if we want to have any semblance of the local wildlife.

300 000 people live in the area and only a few hundred are putting any energy putting into dealing with the place we live in. I would love it if each person put in five to ten hours into this per year.

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My kids want me to do the Earth Hour thing tonight, so I guess we will and see how low we can go.

Looking at Victoria Beacon Hill

This is safe NDP ground. Carole James is the MLA and should have little trouble in getting re-elected. This is one of the seats the NDP almost won during the 2001 disaster.

Dallas Henault is running for the BC Liberals. He is young and passionately loves politics. He is well plugged into the online world.

Adam Saab is the Green candidate. Nice guy, hard working, but nothing to indicate he will pull the Green vote up much.

Viola Langley is running for BC Refederation. She is not the sort of person I would have expected to run for what was a cranky old white guy political party. I will post more on her and other less covered candidates during the election.

The riding has lost Vic West to Esquimalt Royal Roads and gained some area on the northern edge from what was Victoria Hillside. The 2005 results in the boundaries show very little change in the results.


My prediction as a result is as follows:

• Carole James - 14000
• Dallas Henault - 9000
• Adam Saab - 3000
• Viola Langley - 500

Car Dealerships on North Douglas

I am inspired to make this post because of a thread on Vibrant Victoria.

I would love to see all the car dealerships pushed off of Douglas Street. They are very land intensive and create significant dead spaces in the community landscape. The land is mainly covered in parked cars.

At the moment there is about 15.5 acres of land in the City of Victoria near North Douglas is dedicated to car sales. In Saanich there are 12 acres of land dedicated to cars sales in that area. That is 27.5 acres for car sales, this is more than the whole Dockside Green area.

With the coming changes to the the car industry, it would seem realistic to see many of the dealerships in the area close up shop. The time has come to think of what should happen with this land.

The north end of Douglas is the place where Victoria and Saanich should be encouraging the core of the city to be. There are some offices in the area already and there will be more with the new Uptown Centre (the former Town and Country). But there is a lot more that could be done.

This area is well situated to be close to large parts of the regional population, it is the obvious central hub of transit, and it is an ugly blighted area at the moment. It could so much more. I see this as very bad use of the land at the moment. It does nothing to make the entrance to the city look inviting. It also is acres of land that are not friendly to people walking or the building of community.

A comprehensive approach to rebuild the area through rezoning and OCPs could bring us so much more than what we have at the moment. It would be a chance to help recover more of the Cecilia Creek watershed and to add more green space.

At the same time I would like to see some of the areas be protected for light industrial uses and even expanding those to some of the areas that are right now parking lots. We really do not have enough decent light industrial in the region. Ideally some sort of industrial park that is something beautiful at the same time. I would see this integrating light industrial and office space. We spend a lot energy on thoughts of how we can make residential areas something more, but do not think of how to do this with industrial areas. They still remain utilitarian at best.

If the rent is reasonable and the location is good, there are various businesses that could develop in the area. Light industrial is important for a better mix of jobs in the region.

Some meetings on planning in this region

City staff have forwarded a note to VV about a public neighbourhood planning session to be held April 29th.

Here's the note, and click here to view the entire PDF.

The City of Victoria is reviewing its current approach to neighbourhood planning to develop an integrated program for all Victoria neighbourhoods.
A discussion paper that reflects feedback to date and best practices research is now available.
The public is invited to an information session to review the discussion paper and provide input.

Tuesday, April 29, 2008
7 p.m. - 9 p.m.
Victoria City Hall, Antechamber
Registration is not required.

And Meetings on the Victoria Regional Rapid Transit Plan

Public Sessions:

You are encouraged to attend upcoming public sessions where project staff will be available to discuss the VRRTP process and details in person.

The first VRRTP public open house will be held this spring to discuss key transit corridors, their respective advantages, issues and constraints, and to receive input on linkages to the West Shore during the early planning stage of the Victoria Regional Rapid Transit Project. The panels from the open house will also be posted here following the session.

Tuesday, March 31, 2009
4:00 pm to 8:00 pm
Ramada Inn, 123 Gorge Road East

Wednesday, April 1, 2009
4:00 pm to 8:00 pm
Four Points Victoria Gateway, 829 McCallum Road

Additional public sessions will be held as planning continues this summer.

Being sick and stressed really sucks

I have been way behind in posting many of my thoughts and ideas of late because I have been either stressed or sick. I lost all this weekend to something flu like - for the third time I have had flu in 2009.

My yard is behind, thought I managed to plant the apricot tree, my house renos are completely stopped, I am weeks behind in work, and I have pages and pages of ideas to think about/work on. And of course, I am trying to learn how to speak French.

Do you like your local library building?

The Greater Victoria Public Library is holding a series of consultation sessions with the public to find out what people think of the buildings. I have signed up, you should do so as well.

What do you think of your library building?

March 16, 2009

VICTORIA - The Greater Victoria Public Library (GVPL) is holding seven public consultation sessions, hosted by CitySpaces Consulting Ltd., to hear people’s opinions about our library facilities. We need you to tell us what you think about our buildings, parking, computer terminals and more!

Your feedback will help us determine what our libraries will look like over the next fifteen years.

The 'FUV is 25???

I will write something about this later - well expand this later. I can not believe it CFUV is 25. I did my years there from 1984 to 1990. I was there for the grand opening, one of about 25 people. I worked for the Chan Man.
______________________

I will continue this now.
My years with CFUV were exciting and fun. I am very glad to have had the chance to take part in station, it was one of best experiences of my early 20s. My core years there were from June 1986 to January 1990. Only three half years, which seems so short now, but felt like several lifetimes then.

My first exposure was through joining some friends for their radio shows in 1983 when the station was still closed circuit in the SUB.

I tuned in over the airwaves a few weeks before the station was air - I knew that the frequency was to be and knew that they were testing the transmittter. I called into the station and told the DJs (the two chinese guys and Tim Chan and Bob Wong called their show) - they were excited to have some hearing over the air. They passed me over to Steve Lebitshnig, the Station Manager, who was excited to know where I was listening from and how the signal was. I lived on Toquay in Gordon Head at the time.

I came to the official opening of the station in early 1984. kd lang officially opened the station - this was before she was 'someone'. I can still see her in her cow punk look and at the ribbon at the top of the stairs. She had siccors in her hand and cut part way into the ribbon and then went sideways along the ribbon. There were no more than 20 of us there to see the official opening.

In 1984 I often joined in on the Dave Bos radio show, broadcast for midnight to 3 am on Saturday night.

When I returned from Europa and Africa in early 1986, I get seriously involved with the station. I jointly did a classical music show and got the Friday morning folk slot.

I did Friday's Folk from 1986 to early 1990. Thursdays were sub pub night, so many a Friday morning I was rather hung over. I became know as the borrowed but informed voice - best I could do with a pounding head.

With Phil Hoover and Steve Holland, I did a semi-regular late night radio program called the Anarchist Teaparty. It was our quasi homage to the Dave Bos radio show. We did some crazy things on the show, we called the Whitehouse, we investigated the 'tea use' problem at the Oak Bay Teaparty, we faked a rebroadcast of program from CKLR - the first attempt at a radio station at UVic in the 1960s, we held a coup d'etat sweepstakes - guess the country to have a coup in the next month, and so much more. We had a great time with it all. Rob Passingham made us amazing posters for the program, actually they were better than the show.

I worked at the station from 1988 to 1990 for almost no money, but it was even more fun to be paid to be there almost all the time. I got to deal with every imaginable crisis of the moment. Broken mike? I sautered it. No jazz DJ? I suddenly had a three hour jazz show to do.

I had a chance to produce a number of radio plays. I recorded and produced several demos for bands and singers. I made a number of hour long documentaries.

Working with Tim Chan was an amazing riot, there are few people that a drier sense of humour than him. Tim was the station manager for much of the time I was employed there. I was not happy with how the Board of Directors treated him at the end.

Jack Tieleman (brother of Bill) was the music director there for a time in the 1980s. Tieleman was perfectly portrayed in a film by Jack Black in High Fidelity. First time I saw the movie I said "Oh my god, it is Tieleman". I loved how he dealt with the LPs that came into the station. The bad and commercial stuff was normally sold off to somewhere like Lyle's, but sometimes the vinyl needed to be dealt with. Jack would lean out of his office at the end of the hall and yell "Heads up!" and fire the record down 30 feet of hall to smash against the wall.

I remember one great road trip from the station. Ellen Oertzen, Magnus Tyvold, Tereus Scott and I drove to Oakland for an American community radio conference. Some good bands in the bay area, interesting people in the Bay Area, a long non-stop drive in the car I borrowed from my parents while they were in Europe, and a chance to see a protest and set of arrests at People's Park in Berkley.

I met so many bands and artists, most of which I can no longer remember who they were. I met Yothu Yindi and some tall bald Australian guy with a band called Midnight Oil, but because I was so deeply into the alternative music scene, anyone getting mainstream airplay could not be interesting. So many Seattle grunge people came through there that I have no idea who I had met and who I had seen play - ok drugs and alcohol played a part in that. It took me till 2005 to figure out that I had not seen Nirvana in the 1980s - I have had contact with Krist Novoselic because of electoral reform.

I interviewed Don Ross the guitarist with less than a five minute warning - his agent called the station looking for him to talk to him before he went on the air. No one told me he had been booked to be on my show and the call was my first warning he was coming, it gave seconds to get ready.

It was at CFUV that I really got to know Catherine Novak, we shared one fulltime job between us. The day I asked her to marry me, it made the top of the newscast. Catherine and I were married for 16 years, we share three kids and remain good friends.

I helped numerous people get their start in radio. Training new volunteers and helping them on their first shows was part of my job. I was very proud to have helped Larry Bird get the first aboriginal program on the airwaves.

There was a time I called a finance minster a liar on air.

I had a looped tape of Bill Vander Zalm saying "Garbage, garbage, garage, more NDP socialist garbage."

I interviewed David Suzuki in 1988 and it is the only interview that scared me.

I interviewed Claude Richmond and discovered that Socreds were not evil incarnate, in fact they wanted the same things I did.

I was surprised at the large donations the Fundrive recieved each year from PC MP Pat Crofton, and they did not end when he was defeated in 1988. I have gotten to know him slightly through Conservatives circles in the last few years and he is truly a wonderful man.

I sat in on an interview with a holocaust survivor and saw his tatoo, the host of the show and I could say nothing.

I loved all the international progams we recieved, exspecially Moscow Mailbag. The Soviets meant it as something serious, but it was the most maazing ironic and sarcastic take on the Soviet Union.

I remember the 1989 San Francisco earthquake which hit Oakland so badly shortly after I had been there for the radio conference, we connected with the Pacifica station to know what was happening.

I learned more about music from Let the Good Times Roll, Eric Leblanc's show, than anything else in this life. I had to dub the show so that it could be broadcast on some stations elsewhere in Canada.

I learned how to remain calm and relaxed when a crisis happens.

I learned to remove um and ah form speech.

I loved that the station was a campus and community station, that we straddled town and gown.

There were some amazing people at the station in those days: Tereus Scott, Colin Macrae, Jack Showers, Guy Macpherson, Mike Gower, Christina Nyers, Sondra Showers, Barry Link, Tara Todd-Macdonald, Brian Webster, Jim Andrews, Scott Lewis, Shaukat Hussain, Lauri Nerman, and so many more.

There is a lot more I could add, but this is enough for now.

CFUV - an amazing asset in this city and an amazing part of my life.

Oak Bay Gordon Head

The Oak Bay Gordon Head riding is remaining largely in the same form that it had the last few times around. There is some area that has been shaved off on the west is in Victoria Swan Lake.

Ida Chong is running for the fourth time for the BC Liberals.

Jessica Van der Veen is running for the NDP.

A Joel Laforet is listed as being a candidate for Refederation BC. Steven Johns is the candidate for the Greens.

The redistribution makes the riding results for 2005 slightly better for the NDP.

In 1991 and 1996 Elizabeth Cull was the NDP candidate. In 2001 and 2005 Charley Beresford was the NDP candidate. Both of them were well known in those elections. Jessica Van der Veen is an unknown.

2005 there was a lot of anger in the civil service towards the government, but not enough to let the NDP win.

It is now four years later and the anger in Victoria is dramatically less than last time.

I do not see any danger of Ida Chong being defeated here on May 12th. If Ida Chong loses here, the polling numbers in BC have to almost completely reverse from where they have been. The Liberals need to be at 40% and the NDP at 45%. I can not see this happening.

I see the result happening as following:

• Ida Chong 51%
• Jessica Van der Veen 37%
• Green Candidate 11%
• Joel Laforet 1%

Some Old Pics of the Eaton Centre

Back in the 80s I lived in Victoria and was involved in the campaign to oppose the Eaton Centre Mall. I took some pics at the time and found them again after a long time. This first picture is of the Douglas Street side of the Eaton's.

I went down on January 19th 1987, a sunny winter day, and took a series of pictures. I did a bunch of them from an office in the Central Building on View Street

I had completely forgotten where the old Marks and Spencers was, my memory had it on the corner of View and Douglas where the Macdonalds is now. The art deco facade was moved to the Macdonalds.





The Times building had a nice presence on Fort Street which has been lost with the mall, on the other hand the streetscape on Fort Street is better now than then.


I really liked the old buildings at the corner of Broad and Fort Street and was sorry to see them go.


I came back once it was under construction and took some pictures. I was amazed at the view one got of the Eaton's building from Government.

In general my fears about the mall all came to pass. The mall is a huge block that splits the centre of the city up. Government Street between View and Fort feels like a canyon. Fort may have a better streetscape, but the building looms over the street.

View street feels like an alley and not a street any longer.

The loss of Broad Street has blocked the natural walking route that existed there from Centennial Square to the Empress.

The interior of the mall has no relationship to the outside, no sense of connection. The mall on the inside is blandly North American, it could be in any city anywhere on the continent, there is nothing within it that connects to the city. The mall has offered the city nothing to make this a better place.

If there was a need for a mall downtown, it should have been built around Blanshard and Yates. The thinking that went into allowing this mall to be build is the same type of thinking that allowed for 20+ storey concrete bunker buildings like Orchard House or the View Tower(s).

Unfortunately this error of the 1980s can not be undone.

Looking at the Race in Juan de Fuca

This is a race between John Horgan for the NDP and Jody Twa for the Liberals, though unlikely to be suspenseful race.


Changes in the Riding

In the last couple of elections, the bulk of this riding was Malahat Juan de Fuca and reliably NDP most of the time. The changed boundaries move the riding fully into the Capital Regional District. The riding gains Metchosin from the former Esquimalt Metchosin. It places most of the Westshore into one riding but is missing Colwood and the Westshore parts of View Royal.

In a straight transposition from 2005 poll by poll results to the new boundaries, this is a safe NDP riding.

John Horgan

John has been one of the clear strong voices for the NDP in the class of 2005. He is well liked and intelligent. He understands the needs of his area. He is clearly a very strong candidate for the NDP. I am estimating 45% for him.

Jody Twa

Jody was a popular mayor of Colwood and has a good following throughout the Westshore. Problem is that Colwood is not in the riding. I can not see a senario in which he realistically will win this seat. If Stew Young can harness the electoral power he showed in the municipal elections, this might make the race look more competitive, but I do not think it will make enough of a difference. I am estimating 39% for him.

The Rest
There is no Green candidate nominated yet, though I have my suspicions at who it will be. I figure they will take about 9-10% of the vote and not be a factor in the race.

The wikipedia page about the BC election indicates that Refederation BC says they will be running Stephanie Doucette. I can not find anything about her, with less than two months before the election this not a sign of a strong campaign. I am guessing she will take around 2% of the vote.

I suspect that if DRBC does manage to run any sort of slate of candidates, this is one of the areas were they will run.

Victoria Daily Photo Blog

Benjamin Madison does this blog which is a photo from the Victoria area each and every day. Over the weekend he reached the one year mark.

Most blogs are self indulgent rants, rambling meaningless things, repetitive or re-posts of what others have written. I know this because too often what I am posting fits into one of more of the categories. Benjamin manages to avoid this with his approach. He makes an interesting point about how setting a specific goal of one pic a day pushed him to do it consistently and I think better than waiting to only post 'the best'. I suspect many of his posts that he has seen as being not that good are the ones that have touched other people in ways he can not think of.

I enjoy looking at it every day and seeing what he is choosing. Often his images set of a new direction of thinking in my head about this city.

Keep up the good work Benjamin

Expain to me the rain

This winter the weekends when I have had time to work around outside there has been rain. I thought about working outside during the week last week, but had to put it off due to pressing projects.

I dream of a properly dry climate like Lillooet - nine years there had me nicely used to 350 dry days a year. I loved being able to leave books and papers outside knowing that would not rain and there was no dew.

A pox on the rain. I grew up in the lower mainland and learned to hate this wet stuff from the sky.

Blogger Flakiness

There are some comments that should have appeared on here, but due to some flakiness with blogger, they seem to have disappeared, I apologize.

Swimming in the Gorge

In 1998 Dennis Minaker wrote a book called The Gorge of Summers Gone: A History of Victoria's Inland Waterway. You can find it in the local libraries. He does a great job of telling use the history of how we used the waterway. It was in 1939 that swimming was banned due to sewage and industrial waste. But that has been dramatically changed in the last two generations.

I find it interesting at how reluctant people are to swim in the Gorge. People are of the opinion that it is polluted water, that the waste from the past presists.

It has been a long time since the heavy industry has been on the waterway, the houses do not discharge waste into the waterway, and the rate at which the Gorge recharges is quite high, the water does not remain there for any length of time, fecal coliform is not an issue at all in the Gorge. Fish are in the waterway and people catch them. DFO does not close the area to fishing from pollution. There is a potential of some heavy metal pollution in and around Rock Bay and out towards the Inner Harbour, but that heavy metal pollution was not in the Gorge. It is quite safe to swim there, certainly safer than most lakes in this region in August, but people still think it is too dirty or polluted to swim in.

In the past the Gorge Waterway was the recreational centre of Victoria. There was a tall diving tower at Curtis Point that was 110 feet tall - that is like jumping off a ten storey building. There were regular regattas filling the Gorge with boats from bank to bank. Kinsmen park had a salt water pool and was connected by tram to the city to allow people to get out to the water.

The Gorge was never industrialized, the Harbour ended at the railway trestle leaving the water beyond more or less in its natural state.

I would love to see Esquimalt, Victoria, and Saanich offer swimming lessons on the Gorge and not only in their pools. I would love to see a tall tower for diving be built again. Actually, some bathrooms and changing rooms would be nice.

I am happy to see my boys go to the Gorge and swim off of the dock at the Tillicum bridge. The cove there is a perfect swimming hole and has so much there for kids to explore and play with. It is the sort of place to let them really explore their imagination.

My 11 year old goes to Shoreline, the school is right at the water's edge. We live on Harriet Road in Victoria, 620 meters from the water. He has asked if he could try kayaking to school at some point. I think that is a wonderful idea. With a set of wheels, he could wheel it from the house to the Gorge and launch it from there. It is 3 km by water to the closest spot or 5 km to around Christie Point to get to the school.

I would like to buy couple of kayaks this year so that we can get out on the water, so that I can by on the Gorge and reconnect to that which was the heart of this neighbourhood. I would like to see a lot more people in this region find their way back out on to the water.

Latest Real Estate Figures for Victoria

On Monday the Victoria Real Estate Board released the latest figures on real estate sales in the region. They are spinning it as positively as they can by saying February has a big increase from January, but that always happens.

Victoria Stats and Trends has some good information on the stats. He shows us that there is a 10 month inventory of currently available. Anything more than a seven month inventory depresses prices. At 10 months inventory the market should drop by about 2%. I suspect we will reach a 15 month supply by the late spring which should mean a 3% per month fall in price.

The blog HouseHuntVictoria has also covered the new data - a long set of comments worth looking through.

Roger Needs has some very good analysis of the data in a graphical manner here. He also has this nice graph showing long term house prices in the US.

All of them do a good job of looking at the data and the picture is clear, the local market is in freefall. Historical February sales have been the median month of the year. February has also been close to average number of sales as well. Both of these facts point to about 4500 sales in 2009.

The massive drop off in sales means there will be problem for all the real estate agents, we have about 1300 in the region and can support a maximum of 750. There are hundreds of real estate agents that will be looking for new work.

Real Estate agents also have a new problem, they are carrying a lot of stock and less than 10% of it is moving each month. They need to spend more money on advertising to get the houses sold making their overhead higher which means they need to sell more units.

I expect at least a third of the real estate offices in this region to close by the mid fall of this year.

The total value of sales in February is another stat that people should note. In February all sales totaled only $171 million. Other than this last fall and winter, these are the lowest monthly figures in years.

We are now at spring 2007 prices for houses and look like we will see sale prices in the summer be equal to the prices in the spring of 2006. By September prices will have fallen 25% from the peak. This means that people that bought after the spring of 2006 will now own a house worth less than what they paid for it. It gets worse.

The fall and winter are always bad for selling and even in good years will typically show a small decline from the peak on July 1st. This fall we will see an even more dramatic drop in prices as people are forces to sell or have their houses foreclosed on.

By the end of 2009 we should see average house prices in this region drop to about $375 000 to $400 000. On December 31st people in Victoria will be living houses that are of comparable value to December 31st 2004.

Someone that sold a house for $500 000 in May of 2006 that they had bought in 2001 for $250 000 with a $240 000 mortgage realistically had an equity after everything was said and done of about $250 000. Say they used this to buy a $750 000 bigger house with a $500 000 mortgage. Where will they be on December 31st?

They will still owe about $475 000 but have a house worth $600 000. They managed to turn their equity of $250 000 into an equity of $125 000.

Let us move the dates of the scenario to spring of 2007. The house sells for $550 000 and they net an equity of $300 000. They now buy a house for $850 000 and a mortgage of $550 000. December 31 2009 they still owe $535 000 and have a house worth $600 000 - net equity of $65 000. They have lost a huge amount of equity and are not a high risk mortgage because they do not have enough equity. When they renew their mortgage, they will have to pay more.

The equity loss for the family is $235 000 in two and half years, about $90 000 per year. This family could have rented for the same 30 months a very nice house for under $100 000 and have $200 000 in the bank

So where will the market stop? I am not certain, but an average price in the region of $350 000 is completely with the realm of reasonable. If one uses a compound rate over the the ten years that is 50% higher than the rate of inflation, the 2000 average price adjusted for 2010 would be $340 000.

Prices will stabilize when the total units on the market is down to a six month supply. I do not see that happening before the winter of 2010/11.

Run Down of the Seven Local Ridings

There are seven seats in the local area and I believe that six of them are forgone conclusions. The Liberals did badly in 2005 because there was a strong back lash from civil servants, but that anger has largely muted.

Victoria Swan Lake
Rob Flemming won Victoria Hillside easily in 2005. The redrawn boundaries marginally go against him, but his win margin should still be high. He also should have a small incumbent benefit this time around.

Victoria Beacon Hill
Carole James won here very comfortably in 2005 and will have a slightly friendlier riding this time from the boundary changes.

Oak Bay Gordon Head
Ida Chong won by a narrow margin last time but the redrawn boundaries make this riding safer for her. For the NDP to win here would take a dramatic shift in provincial public opinion. If the economy is the issue, the Liberals will benefit.

Saanich North and the Islands
Murray Coell easily won for the Liberals last time and should not be under any threat of losing. The NDP will have to explain to the green Gulf Islanders why they do not believe that the carbon tax is a good idea - good luck with that.

Juan de Fuca
This is the where John Horgan will be running for the NDP. The numbers for 2005 indicate a safe NDP seat.

Esquimalt Royal Roads
Maurine Karajianis won this easily in 2005 as Esquimalt Metchosin. The numbers are there for her to win again. The only potential wildcard would be Jane Sterk, the Green Party leader, but I have seen little evidence of the Greens being ready to run a vigorous campaign in this election. It would a province wide NDP melt down for this to be anything other than an NDP win.

Saanich South
The only riding in this region that is up for grabs. Robin Adair is carrying the flag for the Liberals and Lana Popham for the NDP. Both of them has some reasonable name recognition. The new boundaries favour the Liberals. If all else from 2005 is the same, the Liberals will win. In this riding it will come down to several factors

1. Will green New Democracts stay home or vote Green because of the NDP's odd decision to get rid of the carbon tax?
2. Will the Liberals be able to get out the voters that stayed home in 3005?
3. Will the NDP have the resources and campaign needed to get out the vote here?
4. Will the fear of the economy drive undecided voters to the Liberals?

At the moment I give the edge to the Liberals in this race. Lana Popham is one of the strongest NDP candidates anywhere in the province and only second to John Horgan locally, but candidates in our current electoral system typically only make a major difference in the decision making of a small percent of the public.

On May 13th I expect us to have three Liberals and four New Democrats elected as MLAs in this region.

Opposition to the Bay Street Bus Route

This was on CFAX today:

RESIDENTS OPPOSE BAY STREET BUS SERVICE

Mar 2, 2009

RESIDENTS LIVING ALONG BAY STREET BETWEEN QUADRA AND RICHMOND ARE NOT IMPRESSED WITH PLANS BY BC TRANSIT TO INITIATE FREQUENT CROSS-TOWN BUS SERVICE ALONG BAY STREET.

A GROUP CALLING ITSELF THE BAY STREET COMMUNITY ACTION TEAM IS EXPRESSING CONCERN ABOUT TRAFFIC AND SAFETY ISSUES IF THE BUS SERVICE GOES AHEAD. IN THE MOST RECENT COMMUNITY PLAN, PREPARED IN 1996, THE CRD RECOMMENDED SPEED REDUCTIONS AND BIKE LANES ON BAY STREET, THE RESIDENTS POINT OUT THERE WAS NO MENTION OF BUS SERVICE ALONG THE STREET.

THE RESIDENTS QUESTION THE WISDOM OF LAUNCHING A BUS SERVICE WITHOUT FIRST REVIEWING THE COMMUNITY PLAN IN ORDER TO CONSIDER SAFETY AND TRAFFIC ISSUES. THEY ALSO SAY PARTS OF BAY STREET WERE BUILT ON A SWAMP AND THE ROAD BED IS ALREADY UNSTABLE DUE TO HEAVY TRUCK TRAFFIC.

- KIM O'HARE

All change has to be opposed by someone. The world changes all the time, nothing remains static. I am getting tired by the constant negativity to any change. It is bad for our civil discourse to have everything framed in the form of a debate that is negative.

Change can be formed in a positive manner. We can focus on the good of the changes and explore the underlying interests of the people that misgivings about the change.

In the case of the new bus route, it seems to obvious that it would come someday given the re-orientation of Royal Jubilee so that the main entrance is off of Bay and not Fort. The redevelopment in Vic West also clearly shows a need for more transit.

What are the underlying interest of the people along Bay? I think it is a fear that the buses will be too loud. Is there something that can be done to deal with the noise? How serious is the noise of the buses? Certainly I can tell when they come along Harriet. Normally we have no buses on Harriet, but from time to time do to road problems, buses come along Harriet. They are significantly loud, but they are moving at about 70km/h when they are on Harriet.

I suspect another interest would to avoid the intrusion a bus stop makes. I know how much litter lands on my yard being on a sidewalk of a mid sized street. A bus stop would add a lot more.

Can the city and BC Transit meet the needs of the residents and still bring in the bus route? There has to be a way to do this.

What’s in our regional food basket?

This is another interesting regional food event that I will not be able to make it to - this is the start of spring break and I would like to go somewhere with the family after all of the insanity of the last year to 18 months. If you do go, please drop me a line and let me know how it went.

Friday March 13, 2009
2:00 – 7:00 pm

Burnside Gorge Community Centre
471 Cecelia Road, Victoria

Parking available at the old Burnside Elementary School on Jutland Avenue

Registration - $15 cash or cheque only

Subsidies available upon request

RSVP by Monday March 9th to info@communitycouncil.ca or tel. 250-383-6166

Program
2:00 – 4:00pm

Simultaneous afternoon workshops (please RSVP for your choice in advance)

* Year round public markets in BC’s Capital Region

1. Plans for North Saanich
2. FoodRoots expansion
3. Possibilities for a downtown market

* Increasing access to food for households living on low income – two models of food distribution.
Brent Palmer, Mustard Seed Food Bank
* Hooking up! Potential in community-university partnerships on food issues

4:00pm
Registration

4:30pm
Welcome - Alice Finall, Mayor of North Saanich, on behalf of the CRD Board of Directors

Keynote speakers

• Tom Henry, Metchosin farmer and author
• Cheryl Bryce, traditional foods and land stewardship
• Diane Bernard, The Seaweed Lady

5:15pm

• Getting to know you - speed dating for Foodies and Friends - Bring your business cards!
• Highlights of regional food security happenings – Thanks for submitting your photos!
• Pot luck supper – We’ll provide the soup and salad; your favourite local dish adds to the flavour and fun
• 2009 Food Security Champions Awards – presentations by Lana Popham. Remember to submit your nominations by March 5th
  

Don’t forget to bring:

• A dish to share (optional), and
• Some business cards

There will be space for displays – contact info@communitycouncil.ca or 250-383-6166 if your group is interested so we know how many tables to set up.

Funding support provided through:
Financial support for this project provided by Vancouver Island Health Authority's "Community Food Action Initiative" through ActNow BC - the government of BC's investment in promoting healthy choices through a partnership-based, community-focused approach to improve nutrition, increase physical activity and reduce tobacco use.