Georgia Straight Editor, Charrle Smith, Nails Translunk and Brodie

Stop the presses: Mayor Malcolm Brodie worries about transit finances By Charlie Smith Today on the radio, I heard a clip of Richmond mayor Malcolm Brodie worrying about TransLink finances. It was a stunning moment. Brodie, the former TransLink chair who helped foist the Canada Line on this region, is now concerned that property-tax payers might face higher costs because TransLink will run out of money in a while. The Canada Line hasn't opened yet, so we don't know how much TransLink will have to pay the contractor if this Brodie-supported megaproject doesn't attract 100,000 riders per day. When Brodie was on the TransLink board and voting consistently for the Canada Line, directors claimed that the estimated cost was $1.5 billion to $1.7 billion. Back then, Cambie Street merchants were under the impression that it would be a bored-tunnel project, which wouldn't cause disruptions to their livelihoods. Only later in the process did TransLink fess up that the cost was closer to $2 billion, and only then with a cut-and-cover tunnel that wreaked havoc on Cambie Street businesses. Various concerned parties -- including veteran bus driver and union official Jim Houlahan -- made mincemeat of Canada Line ridership estimates in various presentations to Brodie and other politicians who sat on the TransLink board. Too bad for Houlahan that he wasn't always supported by his friends in the labour movement, who thought that the long-term financial planning at TransLink was peachy keen. In 2003, I wrote a somewhat tongue-in-cheek article predicting the bankruptcy of TransLink because the directors, including Brodie, didn't factor in rising oil prices into their financial planning. Now, oil prices are US$140 per barrel -- almost seven times the price when that article appeared -- and Brodie's freaking out about the impact on property-tax payers in the region. Maybe he should be freaking out about his job. It's time that someone with some planning ability -- hey, how about former mayor Greg Halsey-Brandt, a town planner by profession and someone who opposed the elevated line down Number 3 Road -- stepped up to run against Brodie in 2008. That way when peak oil becomes a reality, someone else can manage the problem. And Brodie can disappear and avoid some of the blame for working to get Richmond land out of the Agricultural Land Reserve at the worst possible time in the region's history for doing this. Politicians who screw up transit systems shouldn't be rewarded by constantly getting reelected. Nor should politicians who failed to anticipate rising oil prices when the evidence was staring them right in the face as far back as 2003.