Environmentally Sustainable or Pay-as-you-Go?
Posted by dfa.ns.ca@gmail.com on October 14, 2011
By Karen Janigan, Communications Officer, Dalhousie Faculty Association
Parking was in danger of becoming a four-letter word in early September as the university administration ignored the fact that the price and availability of parking on campus is a benefit negotiated in the Dalhousie Faculty Association’s collective agreement, which is currently under negotiation. Now, the other shoe has dropped with the release of a draft of the Transportation Demand Management (TDM) Plan at the end of September.
The report, prepared by IBI Group that tends to promote private/public partnerships in transportation initiatives, makes a number of recommendations to manage the transportation situation at Dalhousie University and make it ‘sustainable.’
Some recommendations are pie-in-the-sky like improving campus housing opportunities so more students, faculty and staff can live within an easy walk, cycle or transit ride of the campuses. Some recommendations address issues that are overdue like improving daytime transit service between campuses, providing bike and transit corridors through campuses, providing carpool and rideshare assistance to decrease one-person occupancy trips and improving maintenance of walkways throughout the university landscape as, the report notes: “scarce budgets for maintenance have allowed walkways to deteriorate and surface drainage to fail in many locations…. Certainly street crossings could be improved and winter maintenance of sidewalks and pedestrian corridors is an ongoing concern.”
Still other recommendations are controversial: to wit “change the collective agreement” to make parking on campus pay for itself, as well as pay for some of the improvements, by doubling general parking fees to $50 a month.
When most people hear “sustainable transportation”, they think environmentally sustainable; and having more people walk, cycle, carpool and take transit would have this laudable benefit. The DFA would like to see what the university is offering in place of the subsidized parking, which is a negotiated benefit. According to the statistics in the plan more than 60 per cent of staff and faculty already arrive at work in modes other than the car; and 30 per cent live too far to make using the public transit that is currently in place practicable. (So the value of the elaborate marketing plan suggested may be moot).
Actually subsidizing transit passes, rather than just talking about it may be a start. But cutting existing benefits without putting any of the other recommendations in place would make it clear it is not about the environment, and only about the bottom line.
In fact, the report says, the university has already lost 300 parking spaces between 2006-2010 due to development. Further: “Reduced parking provisions would also help address redevelopment and intensification challenges with limited land resources.” In other words, the aim is reduce how much on-site parking Dalhousie has to offer so it has space to increase its infrastructure for other uses. Is the faculty willing to subsidize facilities the university feels it needs?
The final draft of the report is not due until November, and the university is encouraging feedback at rethink@dal.ca. To read the report Click here.
