Translink- The new Condo King

The story about Translink becoming a Billion dollar landowner, covered by the front page and by Pete McMartin in today's Sun, is an interesting and important issue.

But it seems to me that a few good questions have not been asked.

Yes, it's a good thing that the system can generate money and stop bleeding homeowners who drive and never get on a bus or train.

Yes, it's a good thing that someone will develop communities and hubs of activity - commercial, residential and recreational - around skytrain stations.

But the Big Question of who, who, who gets to do all this has not been sufficiently explored.

The very last paragraph on the front page story is found on page 2. It tells us that the first 3P deal is imminent, maybe as close as a few months away.

OK.

So to whom has Translink's new government appointed, arms-length board been talking?

Peter Wall? David Podmore? The Hell's Angels?

As always, the key to such stories is FOLLOW THE MONEY.

But the public cannot follow what is being obscured.

The Musqueam deal was back-room brokered between two Campbells - Ernie, the aboriginal chief and Gordon, the Premier.

How much of these million-dollar development deals will be back-room brokered between the Great Control Freak Premier and favored developers?

Will new and growing developers have opportunities? Will small companies stand a chance?

Will we ever know, or, much as usual, will we sit back like compliant Canadian sheep and watch the city grow around our 50 inch plasma escape machines?