Posted by Anthony | December 5th, 2011 | 17 Comments »
Last week, city reporter extraordinaire Frances Bula posted in her blog about whether or not cyclists should be banned from using arterial roads. This was an issue that councillor-elect Adriane Carr clumsily raised during the civic election. Bula cited two pieces of evidence for an existing arterial-jam problem: watching “traffic jam up behind a cyclist who has decided to take up a lane on 12th or Hastings or Granville during rush hour,” as well as an anecdote about a lady riding along Broadway.
I don’t really want to rehash the question of whether or not cyclists should be banned on any city road — you can read through the comments on her blog for an interesting (but somewhat derailed) discussion. My take on it is: bicycles are traffic, deal with it.
The “deal with it” means not only should motorists learn to drive with cyclists (and vice versa), but also the city’s engineering department should design and build infrastructure that accommodates all forms of traffic in the city.
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Posted by Anthony | November 13th, 2011 | 4 Comments »
On Saturday, Nov. 19, Vancouver (along with every other BC municipality) goes to the polls. Cycling in Vancouver is a surprisingly hot-button issue in local politics, which is great because it raises the awareness of cycling in the city. It helps that, in general, Vancouver politicians are reasonably cycling-friendly and quite progressive in their approaches to cycling.
The two mainstream candidates for mayor, incumbent Gregor Robertson (Vision Vancouver) and Suzanne Anton (NPA), are both committed cyclists. Ms. Anton has completed a number of long-distance rides including the Vancouver-Whistler GranFondo. Mayor Robertson is well-known for commuting around the city by bicycle, often with city staff and Councillors in tow. read more »
Posted by Rob | January 5th, 2011 | 3 Comments »
Mel Lehan
that the self-proclaimed “Mayor of Kitsilano”
Mel Lehan will be tossing his hat into the ring again when outgoing BC premier Gordon Campbell’s Vancouver-Point Grey constituency goes to by-election. Lehan will be running as a a New Democrat candidate.
Campbell has hinted that he may step down as an MLA after his party chooses a new leader on February 26th. According to Lehan, a by-election could be held as early as August if Campbell vacates his seat in February.
In the May 2009 provincial election, Lehan fell 2,314 votes short of defeating Campbell. Green candidate Stephen Kronstein garnered 2,012 votes and also plans to run again.
Posted by Rob | January 2nd, 2011 | 1 Comment »
Ron Zalko and Amanda Seyfried
According to a report in the Georgia Straight, Kitsilano’s Ron Zalko says he’s ready to run for the legislature if his party promises to eliminate provincial sales taxes on fitness providers.
In a phone interview with the Georgia Straight , Zalko said that he’s willing to be a candidate if B.C. First removes the provincial portion of the HST from not only gyms and fitness clubs, but also in other areas that enhance people’s health, such as triathlon entry fees and bicycles.
In October, Ron Zalko joined the board of B.C. First, the new provincial party created by some of the same people who worked on Bill Vander Zalm’s campaign to scrap the harmonized sales tax.
“A healthy society is a very productive society, and we should encourage people to exercise, motivate them to exercise, and do activity outdoors or indoors—hiking or going to the gym or doing yoga,” Zalko declared. “Don’t tax them and punish them for getting healthy.”
He emphasized that promoting health will reduce costs to the health-care system. “I want to see every fitness provider get relief from taxes and motivate people to be healthy.”
The founder of Ron Zalko Total Body Fitness and Yoga said that about 3,000 members belong to his Kitsilano facility. During the anti-HST initiative, he placed petitions inside the gym for people to sign.
When asked for alternatives to fitness taxes, Zalko replied with a laugh: “Tax them when they buy a Ferrari, and tax them good!”
He also said that the B.C. government should try harder to combat childhood obesity. He noted that this is especially important in this era when kids are spending so much time in front of the computer or texting their friends.
“They have no knowledge about how to eat right or exercise right,” Zalko commented. “I would like to encourage more physical awareness in schools—in high school, elementary school, and kindergarten.”
He recalled that he used to be “fat”, weighing 225 pounds at one point, before deciding to change his lifestyle. He was the first Canadian to complete the Hawaii Ironman Triathlon, in which he wore a T-shirt saying “From fat man to Ironman”.
Photo: Ron Zalko
