To the editor:
Re: "Subway central to 2040 transportation plan," Nov. 2.
TransLink recently released the figures from the 2011 Metro Vancouver Regional trip diary survey: bike 1.8 per cent, walk 11 per cent, transit 14 per cent for a total of 26.8 per cent. This percentage has barely fluctuated since 1994. Expecting it to double when it is obvious the provincial government is neither interested in public transit nor knowledgeable about it means that Vancouver city council has totally lost touch with reality.
There are many towns around the world where public transit is used by a sizable percentage of the population. But it only happened after enough rapid transit lines were built across the entire city to make it practical and attractive to a majority of the people. As it is, a subway to UBC will only help a small percentage of commuters. We need several lines serving Surrey, Langley, White Rock, the North Shore, and also a line serving the southwest of Vancouver.
Where will the money come from? In most of Western Europe, the federal or national governments fund the original lines. Jean-Louis Brussac, Coquitlam
