Dreaming of a Complete Community
Posted: July 7th, 2010 | Author: admin | Filed under: Community Planning | 5 Comments »About a year ago, a dozen or so friends and I came together and formed a group called TRUE GREEN: Solutions for Bowen. To quote the mission statement, we’re…
…a grassroots community organization that advocates for a range of progressive social, economic, and ecological local-government policies and actions to create a more balanced, inclusive, and resilient community.
Bowen Island is grappling with some serious growth and change issues, against a backdrop of mounting challenges such as peak oil, demographic shifts, housing costs, and climate change. We are particularly vulnerable to these tectonic shifts, and struggling mightily with them. This is a special place, distinct from the city that is getting closer all the time. For many, the only response to unavoidable change is to keep it at bay as long as possible, by restricting growth and by effectively raising the drawbridge to newcomers. There is a deeply-grained sentiment that if we are to preserve and protect this jewel, we must keep the people away.
That philosophy has only created a mounting diversity crisis that is gradually changing our character and demographics. At a workshop a few years back, planner HB Lanarc principal Mark Holland said “I’ve never seen a population cap work. You end up with the uber-rich buying out the ultra-rich.”
Meanwhile, we remain deeply dependent on private vehicles and a ferry that, while acting as an effective pain-in-the-ass buffer from the nearby city, spews tonnes of carbon into the atmosphere every year. We produce very little of our own food, have very little cycling or walking infrastructure, and export all our waste—even compostable garden trimmings!—to the mainland. While there is a strong sense of community, there is no community center and not much of an island economy. Few on-island amenities or opportunities mean a steady parade of private vehicles to the city for jobs, school, recreation, and shopping. There’s no franchise fast-food outlet here, but our setup still smacks of suburbia.
Many Bowen Islanders feel that, while we could be doing better in some areas, our current arrangement serves us well. We’re close to Costco when we need it, but still offer authentic island character, a tight-knit community, and small-town charm. Density is bad, 10-acre lots are good. I wrote a feature on this schism a couple years back.
But our group TRUE GREEN — now about 90 members — wants us to together start addressing the looming big issues. We want to have frank conversations about these challenges, our role and responsibilities in creating a safer future for our children and a more resilient community for all. The truth is, we are in a deeply vulnerable position.
Meanwhile, over the past year or so, Bowen Island Municipality has been undergoing an Official Community Plan (OCP) Update. The OCP is effectively the civic constitution. Formed through extensive community engagement, it is designed to guide all municipal decision making.
After a year of public meetings, workshops, and submissions, in the middle of June the hard-working volunteer committee—in conjunction with consulting firm CitySpaces—emerged with a first draft. The first draft is critical because it’s the stage of the process where the committee is likely most open to significant changes. Beyond the first draft, the changes are generally understood to be minor, as the process enters a “tweaking” phase.
Unfortunately, because the process is behind schedule, and due to the challenges of fitting in council and volunteer committee time during the summer months, plus a variety of other reasons, the community was given only 18 days to comment and offer feedback on the 165-page draft.
And feedback it needs. The constitution that will guide us for the next decade recommends no meaningful greenhouse-gas reduction strategies, limits housing forms in a way that will continue to make densifying our village a challenge, overlooks the need for active transportation, on-island waste reduction, and many other issues. Such issues need to be properly framed in a document of this importance.
A subset of True Green members scrambled, and managed to come up with a 5,000-word feedback submission on the draft. Here’s an excerpt from the climate-change section:
As SFU economist Mark Jaccard points out in his book Hot Air: Meeting Canada’s Climate Challenge, Targets are meaningless if they are not attached to policies likely to achieve them.” Unfortunately, this observation applies to the Draft. Instead of recommending land-use and transportation policies that will actually mitigate climate change, the document leans heavily on private citizens, exhorting them to change their behaviors by choosing, for example, more fuel efficient vehicles, and developers, who are encouraged to construct more efficient homes. It also vaguely encourages renewable-energy use. Put simply, these exhortations will not accomplish our provincially mandated carbon-reduction goals.
The most effective strategy to accomplish the stated E.14 objective of reducing the dependence on private vehicle travel is by reducing the need to travel in the first place. We could do this by focusing growth in Snug Cove village, fostering a more complete community with clustered housing, more on-island employment, and a wider range of recreational and educational amenities, and by developing active-transportation infrastructure. The community identified all these strategies as priorities during the consultation process.
In the end, these OCPs are supposed to be about community involvement. We the people effectively write it, and the consultant is supposed to pitch in and advise on sound policy recommendations. But we must do so against a backdrop of the very real challenges, in a way that is honest, integral, and positions us well for what lies ahead. We could have a thriving complete community, with bicycle trails, a humming village populated with a wide spectrum of people from ages and economic backgrounds, a community centre, anything we want. This draft doesn’t help us get there. It has the word “sustainability” on the front, and contains many useful recommendations about how to protect ecosystems, but it basically seeks to maintains the status quo. It attempts to defend a planning model that in my estimation is no longer defensible.
Good thing it’s a still a draft.
We still have work to do here on our little rock, to own up to our responsibilities, role up our sleeves, make good on our commitments, and create a more complete and resilient community through the uncertain times that lie ahead. We need to confront our own culpability in climate change, and prepare ourselves for a future of constrained energy availability. We have an opportunity to lead here. If you live on the island, I hope you will get involved—or stay involved. If you agree with our submission comments, or even if you don’t, please share them with a friend. Thank you.
The problem I see with your logic, James, and the missionary zeal with which you pursue your vision of a model, utopian community is this. It is based, at its centre, on the concept of “more”. More population is the solution, more density leads to more transit, more housing, more employment, more amenities, more night life, more sports, more night lighting, more familiarity, more like, well… like city. Also, more taxes for those amenities, more impact on the environment (each additional individual has a footprint that is imprinted on the land). It ignores the finite, land mass nature of an island community. What I think is that everyone, in the privacy of their own minds, has at an inkling or notion of what is a sustainable, healthy proportion of human community and natural lands. What is yours? Do you really believe that there is no limit to nature’s ability to absorb and sustain a creature population of anything – whether it be humans or wolves? That would be a denial of natural law of sustainability as we know it. Do you support a population on Bowen of 7,000, 10,000, 100,000, 500,000, a million, 5 million? I am sure we all have an idea of what is a sustainable, healthy population for a finite place such as an island, although we may not have consciously considered it. Most of us have an idea where we, personally, would draw a line in the sand. At some point in time, you may find yourself evaluating whether Cates Hill, with its construction of houses looking down upon houses, looking down upon houses is a place where you experience peace, nature and contentment. It is interesting (although not politically correct) to note that many of the high profile proponents of high density housing are not the people choosing to live there – they have houses with plenty of natural lands surrounding them with beautiful views of nature and less of close neighbours. I would like to think that we would plan a community that gives all residents that space and ability to experience our natural,wild spaces – not just urban style ‘green spaces’ that are constructs of urban development. Wild is not to be feared or tamed. I chose Bowen Island as a rural escape and place of sanctuary and I moved here as an act of love of this island and its natural assets. So have many others. Your arrogance in your belief that you, and your supporters, understand what many of us want and need from this place is misplaced and gravely misunderstood. Your mission to make this place into something that fits your vision of a model community is, in some respects, hurtful, threatening and insulting to many others who love and call this place home and appreciate its resistance to being pigeonholed and made “correct” by self-appointed visionaries. The reluctance to adopt a natural park on Bowen speaks volumes – the reticence to have any significant lands off-limits to future development is an anathema to those who want the option to develop until they simply can’t any more, for geographical reasons. Far past the level where development should be halted for sustainability reasons. Let go of ego and vested interests and look outside your support demographic if you truly want island-wide collaboration on this community’s development and future. The conversation is there, if the ears are willing to listen and engage. I am rather doubtful, however, as I think, you think you are the point man for the future and therefore don’t need to listen to different views with any real engagement. Too bad. To be honest, I don’t expect an answer. Your approach seems to be: ignore what you don’t want to discuss because if you do engage, a conversation ensues and and more people start thinking about the issues and that is not necessarily constructive to the ultimate objective. Better to pontificate, be a one-way disseminator of information and avoid discussion and feedback. Do rejoin if I’m wrong, but that seems how it is. Do I expect an answer, no. But, at least I have expressed myself, once again, honestly.
Wynn
Hi Wynn, thanks for responding.
It’s interesting because where you see equate this planning approach with “more more,” and endless development, I see “less less less.”
Less taxes, because our current approach means endlessly escalating roads maintenance budget, for pothole fixing, snow removal, brush cutting, resurfacing etc. We just increased our annual roads budget by $200,000 in an effort to keep up with all the pavement.
Less energy use, less gasoline and diesel burned, because the new residents who will continue to arrive on our island won’t necessarily have to drive so far to pick up a jug of milk or a bottle of wine.
Less traffic. On September 10, and every friday thereafter, it’s going to look like Kingsway in the Cove and around the school, because of new school bus cuts. There are few options for our young families to live in and around the village, so they are spread out everywhere, and at least one day a week, they will all be driving to the school and the four spaces dedicated to ferry drop off twice a day. I’m really hoping hoping people get on board with the carpooling, I know the school district is really making an effort.
Less loneliness for seniors and empty nesters who find themselves isolated at the end of a long road, perhaps feeling increasingly uncomfortable driving to a friend’s place, and finding no options to downsize because we don’t offer a diversity of housing forms.
Less stress on ecosystems and encroachment, because by clustering housing we’re not building more long driveways, and fragmenting habitat. Less water pollution because of less runoff from impervious surfaces,
Less stress on our families, who spend up to four hours a day commuting to the city be able to enjoy this place and raise their kids in this wonderful place, because there is no way to support a mortgage here. The fact that they do anyway is a tribute to just how precious and wonderful Bowen Island is.
etc etc etc….
The new Vancouver magazine (circulation about 80,0000) has a line on the cover: “Bowen Island Boom.” Inside it profiles the island, and a wonderful new young family who have moved here because they want to enjoy the same things all of us do, and the water taxi makes the island more accessible. The piece notes that we are growing three times the provincial average.
There is no drawbridge. We have choices to make.
And I wish you wouldn’t personalize the discussion, but since you have, yes, we delight in our cates hill garden, which is presently overrun with berries and flowers, probably just as yours is. Swallows perform nightly, and a goofy big buck sleeps on the clover out back. The other thing I love about our spot is I can listen to the neighborhood kids out on the road riding bikes and playing street hockey for hours at a time, and pitching people their lemondade stands. On most weekend afternoons, we can also work in the garden and enjoy the cheers of people playing soccer on the field at the school below us down through the woods. We can tune into the ball games as well from the cove. Everyone on our street looks our for one other. We share tools, and share meals. This is community. It is the people.
We could go back and forth like this at our keyboards for hours and hours and only get red in the face. Would you like to meet for a beer one afternoon? (I promise I’ll leave my bible at home.) I’m not going to try and convince you of anything, I promise, but I would really like to get to know you a little better. What say you?
Wynn- That’s quite a rant. Very personal too. I don’t see the connection between what I read from James and what you are interpreting. Where do you see anyone talking about wanting more, more more? Did I miss something?
Sigh. Kim, you are right, it is a rant.
I don’t often go there but, like anyone, I can succumb to a moment of exasperation and frustration when I’m trying to find fertile ground to plant a seed and I hit hardpan. My response was tuned not so much to this particular posting but to this on-going political/ideological strategy of public ‘convincing” to aggressively promote a model of density and community building that, first and foremost, is about encouraging growth and development. It is so convinced of its rightness and inevitability it comes across as arrogant and, because of that, fails to respectfully consider others’ ideas, points of view or acknowledge others’ sense of loss. How do we accommodate one person’s needs/wants without ruining what makes this place special to someone else?
I use Cate’s Hill only as an example of the issues, as well as benefits, that can come of density housing designs. Without exception, when consulted by Cate’s Hill clients, the overriding landscaping issue is privacy, privacy, privacy. Visual, spatial and auditory. Not much I can do for a backyard with 4 or 5 other houses/decks looking down on it. I also regret the proliferation of urban style defenses around the island, e.g., solid wood fences at maximum height and lines of cedar hedges.
I certainly didn’t intend to suggest that it is not a great place to live or raise a family I am sure it is a welcoming and nurturing community for many.
James, a cold beer sounds delightful. Especially in these temperatures. We will both leave our Bibles at home. Anytime.
wynn
Hi James
I like the format of your blog so we are just testing the comments section. Oh yeah – we like the content too of course!