Providing links within and between communities (by safe, paved community trails) has huge advantages for local transport, recreation and to promote tourism.
The alternative is that, to fund a railway, we will have heavy freight traffic and all the industrial developments we currently object to, forced on us. Coal mines and clearcuts along the corridor.
There is no way to take away all the driveways and road crossings that are a reality of the rail route, so no efficient rail service is possible.
And for a single per cent of the $200 million it’s estimated the track repairs will cost, imagine how good a subsidized bus service we could have. This would have the flexibility to run where and when it is needed, unlike the current rail proposal.
A trail not only brings massive benefit, it is in preference to a horrible, expensive, impractical service that has already failed once and has no future against the reality of the route it would be running on.
Linda Graham
Qualicum Beach
