[geoff's two cents]

Originally Posted by BCPhil

As much as some people would like to use the land for yuppie condos and inconvenience the working class all in the name of sustainability, the Viaducts are a part of this city. Taking them out now would be like removing a few ribs so you can fit in your favorite dress.

Sorry, you're still not selling me on this "working class" stuff. If they can afford to drive and insist on doing so when there's perfectly fine transit out there, that's their decision. These people you describe make a lot more money than I do, and I resent having to subsidize a lifestyle characterized by such wasteful extravagance.

Originally Posted by whatnext

Agreed. Just another idiocy from Gregor and his Green Goons, in their attempt to make downtown Vancouver as relevant and vibrant as Brentwood Mall.

If your definition of "vibrant" is having an excess of road space, Brentwood has that in spades. So does Whalley.

Originally Posted by Distill3d

So, uh, if we tear down the Viaducts, are we going to tear down the SkyTrain and put it all underground as well? And while we're at it, lets reroute the bloody Trans Canada Highway to 0 Avenue, and tear down the Port Mann Bridge just so we can reclaim the land and rebuild Port Mann. Lets not stop there though. How about we invent the 0 emission, electric hover car, make it free for everyone to own one, and then we wouldn't need roads at all! We could just fly everywhere.

Nobody's suggesting any of these things. You might consider a career in opposition politics with your apparent love of hyperbole.

Originally Posted by WBC

And if you keep going down that path you will slowly but surely turn downtown into a suburb. Actually more of a resort than a suburb. And that process is already taking place given that new office space is being added along the Broadway/Lougheed corridor and in Burnaby, Surrey and other places. Who knows, maybe one day in not too distant future Metrotown becomes the new business center/downtown of Metro Vancouver.

I think you're onto something here. Indeed, if there's one thing suburbs are known for, it's their lack of road space.

Mr.x, the Toronto example doesn't serve your purposes all that well. The Gardiner Expressway has proven to be an enormous headache for that city in trying to revitalize their extremely lackluster waterfront. Toronto is a classic example of what expressways do to a city; Seattle would be another good one.

Did any of you bother reading lightrail's link? Here it is again in case you forgot: http://www.infrastructurist.com/2009...p-save-a-city/

Although Vancouver is perfectly able to go it's own way with urban planning (it's proven rather more capable than other cities in this regard), if it were to take any cues from other cities, I would rather they emulate Seoul or San Francisco than Toronto or Seattle. My hunch is that most Torontonians would agree.

Again, I advocate tolling non-commercial and -industrial vehicles on the viaducts as an intermediate measure to see how badly these things are actually needed. Worst case scenario? This downtrodden "working class" will simply fork out the extra cash instead of taking transit, and the city can put the revenue towards something else worthwhile that actually beautifies the city.