Questions to candidates running for Council
- What do you think are the benefits of active transportation (e.g. walking, riding a bicycle)?
- Research recommends enabling biking and walking for transport as an important public health measure[i],[ii]. What are your thoughts on the current state of the infrastructure for active transportation in the city? How will you increase the convenience and safety of all modes of transportation, including walking/using a wheelchair, riding a bike, and transit[iii]?
- Lowering speeds to 30 kph in residential areas improves road safety for all users, especially children and seniors[iv]. Calgary citizen groups in many communities are calling on the City to act against speeding. If elected, how will you work to reduce vehicle speeds in residential areas in Calgary?
- Vibrant communities depend upon everyday people using city streets to shop, eat, linger, and walk. Several factors play into the walkability of communities including: intensity, mixing of different types of uses, connectivity, and quality of the urban realm. If elected, how will you increase the walkability and vibrancy of Calgary’s communities?
- Bicycle access to amenities (e.g. work, school, commerce, recreation) requires bicycle facilities that extend beyond our pathways. Of its 18,000 lane-km of roads, Calgary currently has 34 km of bike lanes (2020 target of 180 km), 7.1 km of cycle tracks (2020 target of 30 km), 17.8 km of shared lanes (2020 target of 20 km) and 340 km of signed routes or bike boulevards (2020 target of 370 km). Given that 98% of Calgarians are uncomfortable riding in traffic[v], do you support reallocation of roadway space to provide people on bicycles with equitable, reliable, safe, comfortable, and efficient access to the amenities they need to reach? How would you ensure that 2020 targets are met?
- Do you believe that construction of further stages of the Green Line LRT should continue to be a top priority of the City of Calgary?
- How do you suggest the City of Calgary work towards building the Green Line LRT beyond stage 1 so that full build out can be achieved in both north and south east Calgary? A large part of the Green Line LRT project has been the work done to create land use policies and plans to increase the amount of mixed-use development that will also encourage people to make use of alternative modes of transportation, such as transit. How do you feel this policy and planning work can be applied beyond the Green Line corridor in the rest of the city?
- Rapid transit is an important and well used part of our transit system. Rapid transit is attractive to Calgarians because of it’s efficiency, frequency, and reliability. In recent years, our LRT was expanded to accommodate four cars to meet demand, especially during rush hour along the Red Line. BRT (Bus Rapid Transit) is a new form of rapid transit to Calgary. The four routes that are funded and will be constructed will be an integral part of the transit network. Do you support investments in BRT in Calgary? If you don’t, why not? If you do, what will you do to ensure funding for future projects?
- How will you increase the convenience and appeal of transit as a mode of choice, as well as facilitate the possibility of multi-modal trips (e.g. walking & transit, riding a bike & transit)? What would you do to increase the service hours per capita for Calgary, which currently sits at 2 hours per capita and declining.
- Will you advocate for the prioritization of cold hard cash directed towards alternative transport options, and an urgent move to make on-the-ground changes immediately?
Ward 1
Ans: Health public+ positive attitude +Strong economy + happy families
Ans: Walk path, bike track, and transit have an important mode of transportations, please transit LRT& BRT crucial as we have at least six months of winter and snow. I would like to make sure, roads are properly mowed and safe for general public during winter season, within the community I will encourage bike tracks and walking paths
Ans: Agreed in all residential areas lowering speed limit 30km/h, I will support this motion in the council
Ans: More walk path and I will encourage people to walk for local community strip mall for grocery shopping, I try to allocate land in each community one or two small strip malls within communities, this will create jobs and boost small business
Ans: Yes, Im strong supporter of healthy lifestyle especially bike and walking paths, but please keep in mind we have severe weather conditions for almost six months snow and winter which is not suitable for these kinds of communications. When spending taxpayer money on these kinds of projects, we have too be very smart.
Ans: No
Ans: Our top priority should focus on poverty reduction, affordable housing, eradication of homelessness and joblessness
Ans: Yes, I strongly support BRT, and will make sure these projects will be finished on time without any funding problems
Ans: Morning and evening on round trip fast & subsidies transportation to the downtown and back to the communities
Ans: Yes
Ward 2
Ward 3
Ward 4
Ward 5
Ward 6
The Green Line as presented, due to the mass consultation and significant upfront spend, regardless if the current design, is the best option for the project it should proceed as is…unfortunately the redesign would be short sighted at this point, especially that other levels of government have committed money for this project’s scope this project should continued to be a focus along with full completion of the ring road. I am supportive of BRT as they assist with getting people effectively to and from work and school and can usually be done with less capital costs that other forms of transportation enhancements. Bike lanes also aid in providing effective ways for Calgarians to get around – these should be well planned, and evaluated in other areas of the city but we should also look at a nominal user fee to not discourage use and to ensure they are maintained for our “bikers” and not having non bikers pay taxes for non use.
Walkability within communities is extremely important and proper planning must occur that welcomes projects into neighbourhoods where they are welcomed by the existing neighbourhood. If we can accelerate the welcoming of them and by working with the city and community associations this can aid in well thought out and planned “reverse area structure plans”.
New neighbourhoods and re-planning of existing should incorporate accessibility for all.
We also have to work with evaluating how to make our transit systems balanced and ready for the future by getting ready for autonomous vehicles so we are not overbuilding our infrastructure. In this regard maybe we build out a portion of the green line and use the corridor for busses or creating auto car lanes at a significantly reduced capital expense.
To encourage transit we must offer cost effective convenience, empty parking spots is short sighted when we could have more riders if there was a pay zone that did not discourage transit but made it convenient. Free parking filling up at 6:30 am when there is ample space is not very effective.
I look forward to working with Calgary Transit’s leadership and planning groups needs to meet their goals and which also align with the requirements and requests of our citizens and to what we can best afford.
Ward 7
I’ll answer rapid-fire style:
1. Health, happiness, mental health, environment, cost-savings, space-savings…
2. Inadequate. I will continue to push for better infrastructure for our most vulnerable users – walking, cycling, and accessibility.
3. Yes
4. I will continue to push for funding of our public realm to make active living more comfortable and welcoming, and to increase community vitality and social interaction.
5. My record shows that I’m willing to make difficult decisions to advance our goals.
6. Yes
7. Get the first phase started.
8. Yes
9. Make routes to transit more walkable/bikable. Prioritize transit in the operating budget.
10. Yes.
Ward 8
Ward 9
As a year round cycle commuter (fully acknowledging that Inglewood to City Hall isn’t much of a cycle commute) and a passionate supporter of active mobility choices, the benefits are many: greater personal and societal health, fiscal responsibility, environmental sustainability, safety and happiness. Massively improving active transportation options is a central tenant of my Great Neighbourhoods platform.
I went to City Hall to achieve the Great Neighbourhoods mission of shifting Calgary’s growth trajectory away from uncontrollable suburban sprawl where you have to drive to get anywhere towards sustainable and healthy complete, compact, walkable urban neighbourhoods. I’m proud of the work we’ve achieved over the last seven years in this direction: the establishment and funding of our Route Ahead (a 30 year strategic plan for Calgary Transit) – particularly the city-shaping focus of the GreenLine and SE17 Transitway projects; the reinvestment in the main streets of our Great Neighbourhoods; and, the massive achievement of our cycletrack network are a few of the big shifts. Over the next term I’m focused on the ongoing delivery of these projects, the expansion of our cyclepath and cycletrack networks, and the funding of Step Forward, our completed
but unfunded pedestrian strategy.
I am a huge proponent of the Vision Zero movement and believe that the majority of our neighbourhoods’ streets should be posted (and over time re-engineered) for 30km/hr. The first step in this (outside of pilot opportunities) will be establishing that objective (from the currently recommended 40km/hr) in the review of our pedestrian strategy and then the funding of the strategy.
In order to achieve exactly these outcomes, my Great Neighbourhoods platform called for and is now delivering a next generation of local area plans that, through deep engagement, establish forward-looking complete, mixed-use community-focused policy, and are followed up with City-initiated land use redesignations to allow these outcomes, and are integrated with city (re)investment streams. My mission for the next four years is to ensure that these plans land successfully and that we undertake this work throughout the areas of Calgary that have a fighting chance of having a walkable future.
Absolutely. The added benefit of putting our roads on a diet to allow for bike lanes and cycle tracks is speed reduction on these roads, which greatly improves safety and placemaking.
On top of the shorter-term customer service and technology improvements laid out in The Route Ahead, the big play is deeply integrated transit oriented development. The establishment of walkable communities at every station and the introduction of bike share will greatly expand our transit customer base from almost exclusively commuters to more and more lifestyle transit-users.
My leadership in successfully moving the cycle track program from a street-by-street multi-year build out to an all-at-once pilot was grounded in New York City’s own experience. I’m deeply hopeful that our new Council will continue that work.
If re-elected I will fight for full funding of the Step Forward Pedestrian Strategy. I will also work to develop new funding streams for pedestrian and active-mode public-realm improvements. The establishment of parking benefit districts (directing parking revenues into the communities that have paid parking) is one example. I’m a strong believer that speeding fines should be redirected towards speed control interventions on our neighbourhoods’ streets.
Ward 10
Ward 11
In fact, my full platform speaks directly to the majority of your questions. I would encourage you to read it at janeteremenko.ca.
1. More O2 processed (ie movement) = better health. In the long run healthier people require less health care.
2. We need to be able to easily and readily be able to choose any mode option, I’ve been working to that end with Vision Zero Calgary and Safer Calgary – there is a long way to go, but the conversations have begun.
3. (see 2) I’ve also actively been having conversations with local MLA’s to press the review of the Traffic Act – it’s doesn’t reflect all users and I’ll continue to have that conversation.
4. (see 2 and 3)
5. In some spaces protected bikelanes make sense, in others appropriate design for all users simultaneously makes sense. Utilizing calming measures in the interim until capital is available to revamp will be the tactic.
6. Yes, we’ve been deficient on transit growing with the needs of our large city, we’re needing to catch up!
7. We’re going to need to be the squeaky wheel. Provincial and Federal funding has aided projects; these are projects that will positively impact Calgary, and we haven’t been to the trough frequently enough in regards to Transit.
The second part of the question for me is a conversation around how we’ll intentionally node this city moving forward. Calgary wasn’t a bunch of towns that grew together (GTA, Twin Cities, Dallas/Fort Worth, etc) so we need to create nodes that these smaller towns would have been.
8. I find our city deficient in Transit for our size; we need to keep at the task so the service gets better utilization which will help cash flow, until then we have to continue to provide quality service until the network better serves the need.
9. (see 8)
10. no blank cheques, but yes we need to continue to improve…
Ward 12
Ward 13
Ward 14
Mayor
Calgarians for Transportation Choice 
Discussion: Candidates’ Responses #yycvote