Surrey - The Editor, Transit has become similar to the HST fiasco - no decent ideas about how to solve it. The provincial government should stand up and be responsible by administrating transit, not the region's mayors.
Sadly, too many politicians are more interested in their image and not in making the tough, intelligent and responsible decisions that they have been voted into office to make.The way it is, our transit system is too large to manage. It should be split up into separate entities - the buses and SkyTrain one division, the main roads, bridges and tunnels another division.The buses should run on duty-free fuel. If the federal and provincial governments removed fuel taxes, it would reduce greatly some of the costs of running buses.And the roads, bridges and tunnels throughout B.C. - the users of all these amenities should pay to fund them. An additional amount of money should be raised through a vehicle levy/tax. Even bicycles could contribute by placing an operator user licence similar to a vehicle operator licence. Only bicycle users over 16 years of age would be required to have this. The driving license issue centres could administer them. Fees to be determined.Tolls on all bridges and tunnels could then be shared by all road users and could be eliminated. I am sure the toll collections or whoever administrates them is a drain out of the tolls.If the federal and provincial governments are as committed to transit as they maintain, they could embrace these ideas throughout Canada. Are we not considered to be an oil-rich country? Therefore, give a break to all transit from some of the oil revenue.Martin Cooper,Surrey