On October 15, Moving in a Livable Region held an online forum with three candidates seeking to be elected as MLAs in the Metro Vancouver area. George Affleck (BC Liberals), Bowinn Ma (BC NDP) and Harrison Johnston (BC Green Party) participated in a transit nerd, polite and positive debate about mobility and land use.

Year-round walking is a great way to get your daily dose of physical activity. By making a conscious effort to walk every day, it can be easily incorporated into your daily routine, using 30-minutes to collect your thoughts, connect with friends or get in your daily podcast.

The history of walking, we can imagine, dates back to the history of man. I don’t know anyone who questions why we walk or how we walk, it’s simply ingrained in the human experience. However, the history of walking itself has not looked the same for all, often highlighting social, health, and economic inequities of different individual walking and urban experiences.

Municipalities around BC are taking action to respond to the COVID-19 pandemic introducing new measures — and in some cases changing local laws and regulations — to support physical distancing for residents in public spaces and retail areas.

Increasing the number of local trips we take on foot rather than in a vehicle — and making an effort to stay local and reduce our carbon footprint — can result in long term benefits for our local and global communities.

In British Columbia, we have the opportunity to walk in various regions and across a variety of beautiful landscapes. These landscapes define many of the communities we live in. Fortunately in BC, many communities have put infrastructure and projects in place to encourage walking and make it a safe and accessible option for people of all ages and abilities. This comes in the form of well connected and maintained sidewalks and walking paths and pedestrian plazas.

Walking throughout BC can look very different, and although distance, infrastructure, connectivity and landscape are important, taking into account the regional and cultural context of our urban and rural communities should help guide how we support walking, as opposed to a single, common set of standards.

Mobility for senior citizens is important - for shopping, medical appointments, social occasions and continued participation in community life. In the short-term, having older adults drive themselves to avoid COVID risk makes sense. In the longer-term, the liveability and vibrancy of our communities depends on a public transit system to reduce traffic congestion and provide a healthy alternative to driving.

Back in 2017, Vancouver began working on Gastown Complete Streets, a transportation plan for the city's historic Gastown neighbourhood, which included the concept of Vancouver’s first car-light area, transit and cycling improvements, celebrating the Musqueam, Squamish, and Tsleil-Waututh Nations on whose territory it was founded, and acknowledging the area’s complex history in relation to indigenous people. Then COVID-19 arrived.

Communities around BC are actively taking action to make streets safer for pedestrians -- this includes pedestrian plazas, car-free days and slower streets.

Making our communities safer for pedestrians benefits all modes of transportation, and contributes to the fundamental principles of Vision Zero - to promote safe mobility and to eliminate harm to all road users.

Walking can contribute to the health of our local economies by helping us stay and shop locally, and build relationships with local businesses. This is particularly important during phase 3 of the BC Restart Plan, when many local businesses need our support, including local grocers, cafes, restaurants, galleries, boutiques, and breweries.

The COVID19 pandemic has led British Columbians to rethink the way we move around our communities and how we inhabit the space within them. With the rise of this ‘new normal’ and Dr.Bonnie Henry’s plea to ‘please go outside’, many municipalities are changing how space is allocated to allow for more accessible opportunities for active transportation -- walking included.

The pandemic has presented transportation challenges to older adults with underlying health conditions. Now that physicians are opening their offices for in-person appointments and hospitals are recommencing routine procedures, seniors’ transportation remains an unresolved issue.

New spaces for walking and queuing. Re-allocated travel lanes for cycling and rolling. Expanded patios on streets to support the restaurant sector. These are just a few examples of initiatives being introduced by local governments over the past few weeks to support British Columbians, as we all look for ways to get back to commuting, shopping, dining out and recreation…while also aiming to maintain our distance.

Like everyone, we have felt the repercussions of the current pandemic. Our team is healthy, which is the most important part. We’re taking it day by day.

Like most non-profit organizations, we don’t know what this will mean for our operations. BEST prides itself on offering valuable services, such as The Bicycle Valet and Parkbus, which operate as social enterprises. The Bicycle Valet provides free and secure bike parking for events, the vast majority of which will not operate this year. Parkbus provides bus transportation to mainly Provincial Parks, which are not currently open.

The Climate Emergency Action Plan — announced just months after City Council declared a climate emergency in 2019 — proposes to mitigate some of the causes and effects of climate change by focusing on providing services and amenities close to where people live. Sustainable transportation plays an integral part of the plan, which is why calls one of its strategic pillars How We Move.