Municipal Election 2021 - Candidate answers on Active Transportation
Since our 2021 municipal election comes fast on the heels of our federal election, many members have asked us “I haven’t had time to research the NINETEEN candidates for council? How should I vote?”. While it’s not our goal for Bike Cochrane to become a pressure or political society, it is our goal to advocate on behalf of cyclists to have meaningful change in our community for better active transportation.
As such, we reached out (and followed up) with all of the council candidates asking them to answer a few questions about their position and platforms around funding active transportation. In order to help our members make an educated decision, we are publishing their answers (slightly edited to fit for space) and our questions here. I will say that I’m pleased that 17 of 19 of our candidates responded to our questions and many reached out for more information and to chat about Bike Cochrane. I’m also pleased that almost all of the candidates indicated a desire to begin investing in Cochrane as a ‘Complete Community’ rather than simply putting more money into highways/roads/vehicle investments! This is already a win in our eyes!
If you have any follow-up questions, please email Paul (chair of active transportation committee) at paul@bikecochrane.com. The most important obligation you have as a citizen is to engage during an election cycle, research your options and VOTE! Early voting starts Oct 12 with our election on Oct 18th.
Message to candidates:
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Bike Cochrane (www.bikecochrane.com) is Cochrane’s non-profit cycling advocacy society committed to making our Town more bike friendly. In the last 12 months, we have collectively volunteered over 1,500 hours of our time to making Cochrane a more bike-friendly community! With a fast-growing paid membership of over 350 members, we represent cyclists and advocate for our Town and province to improve our pathways and trail network in the spirit of making it better for all to enjoy themselves on bikes and by foot, since every dollar put into pathways and trails helps cyclists, but also helps walkers, parents with strollers, people in wheelchairs and mobility scooters, along with people recreating with pets.
We have fundraised (~$100K), built, and actively maintain the Launchpad Bike Park (at 30 Bow St if you haven’t visited it). We actively maintain, build, and repair trails in town (see recent boardwalk built near the Grandfather Tree). We have a data-sharing agreement with the Town and actively count cyclists and analyze traffic on our pathways today, as we jointly write grants with the Town to increase the funding available to improve our pathways and bike paths in Cochrane. We look forward to working with you to improve cycling in Cochrane if you are successful in your bid to join (or be re-elected to) Cochrane’s Town Council.
Since more than 60% of our most recent 2020 Active Transportation survey in Cochrane told us that CONNECTIVITY is their biggest issue, Bike Cochrane would like you to take a few minutes to talk to our members and answer the following questions to be shared with our membership in our next newsletter and blog prior to the election. While we are not a political group and won’t be endorsing candidates, consider this an easy opportunity to share your thoughts with 350+ physically active and community-minded voters in Cochrane.
While the last council listed as a strategic priority “focus on multi-modal transportation solutions”, the amount of actual funding that went into pathways and non-vehicular connectivity was relatively small. From a recent analysis that Bike Cochrane did of the Town of Cochrane’s budget relative to other similar-sized towns, this is how Cochrane fared (see below). How would you ensure that council’s priorities like active transportation and connectivity is actually funded?
Capital Budget Analysis for Cochrane 2021-23 and comparison to similar Towns
2. Do you ride a bike for pleasure or for transportation today? If so, where is your favourite place to ride a bike in the Cochrane area?
3. What do you think are the biggest barriers to increasing Cochrane’s proportion of trips taken by foot/bike/scooter (known as ‘mode share’ in active transportation circles and presently around 4% in Cochrane per the 2011 census)? This can have a HUGE effect in reducing vehicular traffic if it’s a well-designed piece of the transportation plan for Cochrane. Specifically, in the work Bike Cochrane has done with encouraging ‘wheeling and walking to school’, we’ve heard from many parents with 91% of the respondents in our 2021 survey (~300 parents) telling us they WANT to bike/walk to school. How would you reduce those barriers if you are successful in being elected to Council? To help your thoughts here, I’ve included a word cloud from our recent ‘Bike to School’ survey where parents answered questions about what makes them feel unsafe when biking/walking in Cochrane:
Word cloud of responses when parents answer “What makes them feel unsafe when Wheeling and Walking in Cochrane”
COUNCIL CANDIDATES ANSWERS HERE
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If you’re still reading here (I applaud you), but also, I’d offer one last thought. To those who think Cochrane is profligate or ‘spends way too much’, the active transportation committee found a striking example of how incredibly underfunded our Town is relative to the next 17 municipalities in Alberta (CFIB Municipal Spending 2021 report). This results in not having enough people at the Town to do things like write grants to bring in more money for projects (and why Bike Cochrane is doing that), or maintain our trails (which is why Bike Cochrane has been stepping in to fix trails). Our Town administration is an incredible example of people who care for the Town stepping up and ‘just trying to keep the lights on’. But, we need to give them the tools and the resources to complete the tasks of implementing plans like our recent Corridor Plan, Connecting Cochrane (2017), and our Bike Network Plan (2012). See a chart from here that shows how under-funded the Town is. It’s awkward for Bike Cochrane to say ‘we need to raise taxes’, but the data doesn’t lie here. You wouldn’t ask a plumber in your home to fix your leaking pipes and then not give him/her a pipe wrench. Our Town NEEDS the tools and staff to bring our Town into this century and start building Cochrane for the future of our kids.
CFIB report highlighting Cochrane’s incredible 'operating efficiency’ but highlighting a major gap in funding
With that, thanks for reading, VOTE on Oct 18th, and please consider volunteering with the Active Transportation Committee if you’re passionate about this topic. Reach out to paul@bikecochrane.com and attend our regular meetings to see how you can help!
Yours in cycling,
-Paul