Free on-street parking isn't worth the cost | Letters to the Editor

Columnist Mohammed Adam (with whom I rarely disagree) claims this is a debate worth having . Well, perhaps a very brief debate; the answer to the headline: Bonkers.

It is reported that enforcement of the pay-for-time meter regime eats a substantial amount of meter revenue. Free parking with, presumably, enforced time limits and only conviction revenue would cost far more. As it is, an enforcement vehicle need only stop at expired meters to issue tickets. If free parking were time-limited, every licence number would have to recorded once, then checked again after the allowed time to ascertain if a violation had occurred — two visits per vehicle. A huge and costly burden on bylaw officers and tax revenue. A major employment program for many more enforcers, though.

Or there could be no time limits, so no “turnover.” This would lead to an early morning daily race, for returnees to office, to grab spaces for the day. Shoppers need not search for parking; there would be none.

So a Carleton University professor has done a study showing that banning vehicles from parts of the Queen Elizabeth Driveway and reserving those areas for bicycles results in reduced emissions and noise.

I’m sure he’s right. But what about all the vehicles that are diverted onto the nearby residential streets where they inch along from stop sign to stop sign, belching out far more emissions than they would sailing along the Driveway at a steady 40 km/hr?

To stave off the paving of yet another paradise, I have tried to make those wanting a bridge at Kettle Island understand basic Grade 10 biology. The wilful blindness to simple science in this case is stunning.

First you have to understand that a biome is a large, naturally occurring community of flora and fauna occupying a major habitat (e.g., forest, tundra or island). The incredibly diverse and unique biomes of Kettle, Upper Duck and Lower Duck islands, and to a degree Petrie Island, are so interconnected that they actually constitute one single biome. In some places, you would not get your hair wet wading between Kettle and Upper Duck. Birds, turtles, snakes, fish and flora freely flow from one to the other.

The razing of the biome of Kettle Island would be, in fact, the razing of the entire chain. Add to that the first noise and stench of construction, and then big trucks to follow, scaring sensitive animals away from the entire area.