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International
Smart Growth, Not Wider Highways, Needed for Halifax Region, Says Victoria Transport Institute Director
Instead of planning to widen two-lane highways 101 and 103, which would disperse more people away from Halifax, the province should promote smart growth, advises Victoria Transport Policy Institute Executive Director Todd Litman in the new ''Sustainable Transportation for Nova Scotia'' report, which enumerates economic, environmental and social advantages of compact, mixed-use, pedestrian-friendly development near transit, including lower commuting costs, gas use and air pollution; better public health, fitness and safety; and traffic fatality rates cut by some 75 percent.
Co-author of the report, released by the GPI (Genuine Progress Index) Atlantic researchers of the GPI Transportation Accounts, director Litman points out that one of the top determinants of peoples' exposure to traffic accidents is the distance they drive, ''particularly on higher speed suburban and rural roads.''
GPI Atlantic's mission, explains accomplished educator and book author Silver Donald Cameron in his weekly Halifax Sunday Herald column, is to measure ''genuine social progress, as opposed to gross economic activity, by applying 'full-cost accounting' right across the economy.''
Based in the St. Margarets Bay area, GPI researchers ''count everything of value -- including things like housework, volunteerism, standing forests or untapped mineral deposits, all of which are ignored by traditional measurements of GDP.''
Conversely, they ''deduct the cost of things that diminish our real wealth and security even though they do create economic activity -- crime, pollution, resource depletion and natural disasters, all of which count as positives in the GDP.''
With the GPI report finding that people usually travel for access, the author observes, ''We travel to get to work, to see our families, to go shopping. We don't particularly want to drive 30 or 40 minutes to do these things, but the layout of our lives and our cities demands it.''
Calling smart growth perfect for ''a province where wonderful small communities already surround the only city of consequence,'' the author asks readers to imagine them all ''linked to Halifax by rapid light rail'' and once again quotes director Litman.
Smart growth, the director writes, would ''address the needs of an aging population, reduce the economic risks from rising fuel prices and climate change, support economic development and allow individual consumers to choose the lifestyles they prefer.''
Provincial decision-makers should heed the GPI recommendations, the author concludes, disappointed by reaction from Transportation Minister Angus Mac-Isaac, who said, ''I don't think the people of Nova Scotia are ready for this.'' -- Halifax Sunday Herald 12/13/2006
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