A right-of-way through Bert Flinn Park will remain an option for a future connection to the Ioco lands after Port Moody council rejected a proposal to remove it from consideration.

The decision Tuesday followed council listening to two hours of public input. The majority of speakers favoured retaining the option because Ioco Road is already too dangerous and congested to handle any more traffic to and from any future development of the Ioco lands.

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The original motion to remove a future right-of-way bisecting the park that has been in the city’s plans since the 1980s was made in September 2016 by Coun. Rob Vagramov. The right-of-way had been retained as part of the 1999 referendum that created the park but Vagramov’s motion called for it to be turned into a recreational component of the park.

A staff report on the motion, however, recommended it remain as an option because Ioco Road has limited capacity to accommodate more traffic generated by future development.

Coun. Diana Dilworth said the city should keep its options open until land owner the Brilliant Circle Group makes a development proposal for the 250 acres, 100 of which are in Port Moody and the rest in Anmore.

“Leave it there and deal with it when it comes,” said Dilworth. “We have no idea what the development may or may not be.”

Mayor Mike Clay said not supporting the motion doesn’t mean the city will build the road.

The only councillors to vote in favour of ditching the right-of-way were Vagramov and Hunter Madsen, who has operated the savebertflinnpark.ca website since 2015.

Madsen said he shares the concerns about Ioco Road many residents expressed but said the street would remain a more direct route to the lands than a David Avenue connector, which would mean most motorists would still choose Ioco Road.

“What I’m trying to do is keep the Ioco Road residents from walking into a trap,” said Madsen. “There are better solutions to Ioco Road [than a David Avenue extension].”

During the public input, which followed a two-and-a-half-hour public hearing prior to the regular council meeting, 32 speakers supported retaining the right-of-way option while seven opposed.

Fathers Jeremy Benson and Cameron Kulak, whose families reside on Ioco Road, read letters they said their daughters intended to present to council but couldn’t. “They had a bed time to make,” said Benson. They said they want the option retained because they don’t want to see more traffic on Ioco. Benson’s daughter Elizabeth wrote that it’s already too dangerous to cross the road to visit Kulak’s kids, Hanna and Vienna.

“It’s very scary when cars fly past us,” read her father.

David Stuart of the Pleasantside Community Association said the neighbourhood’s residents have many diverse views but his opinion is that the city should wait until the planning process is underway.

“Once you make those decisions, that should drive your transportation decision,” Stuart said. “What you have now is a process that is pitting neighbours against neighbours.”

Other speakers who supported retaining the extension pointed that Banff and Jasper national parks as well as Stanley Park in Vancouver have roads running through them that don’t reduce their recreational and environmental value.

Many feared not building a connector would increase traffic on Ioco Road, a two-lane street that some speakers pointed out has limited room for widening, when the lands are developed.

But supporters of getting rid of the right-of-way option and saving the space for parkland said a David Avenue extension isn’t the answer.

“They will still use Ioco Road because it will be longer going through David,” said Jan Stockford. “It is not in the interests of the residents of Port Moody. It would only be benefit a developer. It would allow more housing and more profits.”

The report also recommends a Strong Road and East Road connector route that goes around the northern and easter edges of the park be one of the options to be considered. Both those roads are in neighbouring Anmore.

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