John Davis’ letter to the editor astounded me. He has it backwards- his is the small town attitude in thinking that there are any benefits in bringing all of that polluting through traffic into the downtown area of any city in the north and central Okanagan.
Tourists usually travel with a destination in mind and will divert their route if need be, not drive through congested local traffic looking for what? We have limited access to the lakes, plenty of sports facilities and Silver Star for winter sports.
Also, what kind of high paying businesses is there that we can attract that is clean? We had a high-tech park set aside here for about 10 years which attracted nothing, and when the one business already here relocated, he went out of the city limits.
As for the catastrophic accident waiting to happen on Mission Hill, will it happen tomorrow, next week or month?
Do you not remember what happened in Kamloops with run-away trucks before they made their bypass? Losing the railway through the valley just puts more pressure on our already overcrowded roads.
Let’s look at this traffic problem from another point by getting a bypass back in the OCP and working on relieving the traffic pollution.
The west side of Okanagan Lake makes perfect sense, just as it did back in 1942 when the American engineers surveyed an inside route up to Alaska or even further back, the fur brigade trail.
They knew the best way to traverse this beautiful valley back then and now it’s up to us in the North Okanagan to promote this bypass once again.
If you believe that a bypass should be put back into the official community plan, write rmiles@vernon.ca with your comments so council can debate and include it.
Joanne Georgeson
Vernon
