Some Days

There are days (I am sitting in my car and moving at a dead stop), when thoughts come across my mind like: “who are all these morons who cannot see the clear and present problem here?” “How can anyone with any direct authority look at this situation and think, ‘yeah this is fine, I don’t know what everyone is talking about? We don’t need to do a thing.’”

These individuals literally have no clue how this problem has needed to be addressed since the 1980’s and why do they have no comprehension of the problem? Those who are in a position to do something simply ignore it because it does not impact them in their ability to work, travel, or commercial endeavors or provide political benefit.

Yes what I am talking about is Highway One. The highway that morphs into a parking lot at some point most days, anywhere from 232nd street in Langley to Hope, in both directions might I add. Our politicians and bureaucrats live in Victoria, not the Lower Mainland and Fraser Valley. Most of them only go through the Valley when on holidays. I doubt many have experienced the joy and wonderment of being stuck in 39 degree heat on a highway built in 1961 when the population of all of BC was 1.6 million. Today the population of the Lower Mainland and Fraser Valley alone is 3.1 million and the BC population is 5.2 million.

Gee, I don’t think it takes a degree in Advanced Mathematics to figure out that a 60 year old two lane highway, the only main artery connecting the rest of BC and lower mainland, is probably being stretched to its frickin limit.

Yet what do those in Power continue to do? Ignore it; until they are forced to do something to give the appearance of fixing the problem for the media drop. How do they approach the problem? They look for an expensive and ineffectual way to band aid the problem. As proof I submit the variable speed corridor that was installed between Abbotsford and Chilliwack at a cost of over $25 million dollars. Each one of those Variable Speed signs cost and average $1 million and there are 23 of them.

I agree with the signs for winter, to be able to slow traffic down in poor conditions, makes sense. However, this was sold as a way to manage traffic flow all year round but no one follows the signs with few exceptions, so everyone is still trying to get to whatever destination they seek as fast as possible. I know this as I have been on the Highway where the sign says 80 km/h and everyone is still doing over 100. Further to this, explain to me if you have a long weekend in the summer and all the additional holiday traffic as a result, how does it makes any sense to slow traffic down? From what I have seen, this investment in signs has done little to fix the limitations of the Highway.

Speaking of signs, the government spent $25 million on 23 variable corridor signs in the Fraser Valley, but I bet there are not 20 signs from Chilliwack to Vancouver that tell drivers to get out of the fast lane and let others pass. I personally love getting stuck behind someone driving 90 in the fast lane oblivious to the fact they have a kilometer of cars backed up behind them….dah dah dah(Actually when I am behind them I flash the high beams and the occasional horn, makes me feel better and wakes them the frick up).

Anyways, those in power fail to realize the highways problem as there chief concern is protecting government finances from frivolous expenditures like improved infrastructure that can move goods, services and people more quickly and efficiently and thus making the economy more profitable and reducing greenhouse gas emissions.

So what got me so fired up about this issue? In the last few weeks I have had to travel on the Highway on a few occasions and without exception all my trips have had delays due to the traffic on the highway. On one return trip from Langley I got caught in an issue at 232nd, to only get stuck in another at 264th and then just for shits and giggles one more at Mt Lehman. It added over an hour and 15 minutes to what should have been a 45 minute trip. Oh yeah I was running HOT!!!!

It is ridiculous and absurd for the government of BC to keep delaying what has to be done. They will argue they don’t have the money. Well then go to the Federal government, after all it is a national highway, and get them to help pay for it. On gasoline there is a $.10 per liter Federal excise tax that is to help pay for roads bridges etc. In BC on Gasoline the Federal government collects over $600 million a year and from the Carbon Tax the BC government collects nearly $1 billion per year. Where does all this money really go? That’s right, general revenue and from there to where the government can use those funds for political advantage while motorists sit, the same motorists who pay the taxes in the first place.

The last Federal government announcement to improve the Highway was back in 2019 where they pledged $185 million to 6 projects on Highway One, unfortunately not one dollar for the problem here, but for projects in Langley and Salmon Arm areas. Wow $185 million and in that time to complete the project the Feds will collect about $2.8 billion in excise taxes on gas and the BC government will collect nearly $5 billion in Carbon tax from fuel sales. Greedy Fkr’s all, while we schmucks bake in the heat on a highway that moonlights as a parking lot.

So what needs to be done? Well in my opinion it is pretty clear cut; expand the highway to three lanes plus an HOV lane. Build it now and build it bigger all the way to Hope as that is where traffic splits between the Hope-Princeton, Fraser Canyon and Coquihalla Highways. Easier said than done you might say and you are right to get things done you need to motivate the politicians and for that I have a cunning plan…..

To get all the politicians and decision makers really motivated, we get both the NDP and Libera leaders in the legislature, add in PM Photo Op and his gang, place them in black vans without any working AC or windows on a hot summer Friday afternoon of a long weekend and have them drive from Vancouver to Hope and back and see if that motivates them to get the frickin highway fixed.
I for one am pissed off having to negotiate that parking lot and paying the enormous taxes on fuel at all levels of government. It is time our politicians started applying a little logic and common sense and do the much needed highway improvement that has been ignored for the past 20 years.

Update on China In my China blog I talked about how China has taken advantage of Most Favored Nation status to keep tariff’s low for them as a “developing economy”. China was recently hit with anti-dumping tariffs on furniture sent to Canada. A few Canadian furniture manufacturers took their case that China was aggressively dumping to the government and a tariff was leveled against Chinese imports(295%). Dumping is essentially selling products in the market at reduced costs and undercutting domestic manufacturing in order to gain market share. Excellent I thought and about time but it took a group of Canadian Manufacturers to point this out about China’s trade practices, but at least the Canadian government did something to protect Canadian industry. Now only 5,412 more items listed in the trade agreement for the Canadian government to impose realistic and meaningful duties on.