The Editor,
Mayor Malcolm Brodie commented in the Vancouver Sun a few weeks ago, regarding the latest development proposal for the city centre. He stated, "The key to managing all our growth is sound planning. We have an area plan designed to ensure growth, improve our quality of life and sustain a balanced economy and at the same time we want to protect our farmland, our single-family neighbourhoods and also our environment."
Are you kidding me? Brodie, have you ever taken a drive down Saunders Road, Bates Road area, or any older neighbourhood in Richmond, and seen what is happening to single-family neighbourhoods?
And the environment, please. For every single home bulldozed, along with it goes every single tree. Ditches get covered over (so large pools of water now sit on the road in front of our house because the water has nowhere to go).
Not to mention the loss of the little creatures that live there. We've seen beautiful, old trees ripped out of the ground. Yards are left bare and cemented over. As long as the developers pay for the removal of the trees is really the bottom line, not the environment.
There is no regard for families living in these neighbourhoods whatsoever. There's constant construction noise from the destruction of single-family neighbourhoods. Yes, that makes for peaceful and friendly neighbourhoods, doesn't it?
And the new monster homes being built sit empty. So stop lying to the people in this city. You may as well tell it like it really is.
How you got in this term is beyond me.
Leslie MacDougall Richmond
