Dear editor,
I moved to the Comox Valley in 1970, and over the next 10 years, kept hearing about the “second crossing,” which 12 or 13 years later became the 17th Street Bridge.
In 1986 I returned and for the past eight to 10 years, I have listened to the rumblings of a third crossing — wherever and whenever?
The latest controversy is the location for the new hospital and if in fact it could or should be one large facility for the North Central Island or two smaller ones (one each for the Comox Valley and another for Campbell River).
I don’t think it takes a member of Mensa to deduce that a larger, better-equipped facility within a 30- to 40-minute drive would better serve the vast majority of people between both communities.
No. The NIMBY and LIMBY groups (not in my back yard/locate in my back yard) are too busy arguing to agree on anything.
Then if that’s not enough, an area the size of what should be the parking lot is being considered in a location already having traffic problems.
My solution — a few years ago we (the regional district) were offered a 40-acre parcel of land free to build a new hospital near the new Inland Island Highway. Enough room to expand, have a large parking lot, chopper pad, and accessible to all within a reasonable driving time and distance.
There were a few strings attached but it sounded quite doable.
The present option of moving the chosen site a few hundred yards up the road by North Island College to a smaller lot makes even less sense than the first selection.
Stop thinking two years down the road and try thinking 20 to 30 years down the road.
The deal-makers in the Comox Valley and Campbell River should get their heads out of the sand and think of the future patients instead of their own selfish egos.
There is a job to do. Get on with it. Put your brains in gear, your mouths in neutral and your egos in park!
Chances are the second coming will happen before any of these latest projects. My apologies to the church-goers in the community.
Brian Lavigne,
Comox
