Dear Editor:

The North Shore News has been presented with a stellar opportunity to help determine where its readers stand regarding an issue that plagues most of us in the Lower Mainland daily: increasingly restrictive traffic gridlock that in no small part is the result of widespread construction.

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In their respective April letters to the North Shore News, Barbara Eifler and Melodie Gosling presented directly opposing views, with the ongoing construction at Edgemont Village being the specific focus. Hard as I daily try to “take a deep breath and relax,” as advised by Gosling, I first would need a lobotomy to do so.

She suggests that instead of voicing our anger at the utter lack of co-ordination between city planners (transportation infrastructure) and real estate developers, we should relax by walking or cycling to work and having our children get to school and back in a similar manner.

Planet Vancouver calling Melodie ... are you kidding? How many of us are in a position to live near enough to where we and our children daily need to be?

I work at UBC, but for some mysterious reason am a few dollars short of the $4 million that I’d need to get into the family home market anywhere within reasonable walking or even biking distance of the place.

I used to cycle regularly from West Vancouver to UBC, but in 2012 the high cost of living there pushed us out to Horseshoe Bay (from where we are being pushed again). Now, I’m a lifelong serious cyclist, but cycling 64 kilometres daily to get to my place of employment is a bit excessive and impractical, as is having my six-year-old cycle 16 km to get to/from her Grade 1 class. But according to Gosling, I “need to slow down and not rush to my grave.”

What is leading me to an early grave is the stress created by Vancouver’s dozens of seeming war zones, like the construction-torn Edgemont Village, where Mercedes, BMWs and other motor vehicles designed to travel 200 km/h are ambling along at average velocities of 2 km/h. So drivers can either relax or see the asinine scenario for what it really is ... . As for solutions to fix this mounting mess? Ask our politicians.

Walter Cicha

West Vancouver

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