To the editor,
Re: Walkway concepts developed, May 5.
After spending $650,000 on consultants over the last four years, the City of Nanaimo is yet again – for the umpteenth time over the last few decades – talking about a waterfront walkway along Departure Bay.
Is it really a good idea to consider a hyper-expensive, complicated mega-project – which requires approval from DFO, the SFN, B.C. Ferries, Transport Canada, the province and 30 individual private property owners – when the city has been unable or unwilling to complete gaps in the walkway along Newcastle Channel, which is the connection between downtown and any new walkway along Departure Bay?
Take a walk along Newcastle Channel one day and see what an embarrassment it is: unmaintained, narrow sidewalks; a walkway that randomly starts and stops, blocked by derelict buildings, garbage and overgrown blackberry brambles; and signage that hasn’t been updated in 20 years.
Does a local government and council that is incapable of completing even a relatively low cost, simple project with three stakeholders (the port, MOTI, and the city), really think it can successfully complete a complex project with 36 stakeholders and a cost of at least $20 million?
The only winners will be the consultants.
John Dacombe, Nanaimo
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