Quote:
Originally Posted by Muta
Meh, can't please everybody. Nothing is perfect. It still fundamentally makes sense. Living on a big property is still ultimately a lifestyle choice; you can choose to live in the inner-city, too. Inner-city living is high-density, and ultimately results in a lower ecological footprint no matter how you look at it. That's the whole point of it; for every one person that lives downtown and drives out, there's 10 that live out and drive downtown. Owning a Hummer / SUV / 350 Dodge Ram or whatever they're called only compunds to that problem in an ecological sense - and there's LOTS of them in Calgary.
|
I agree with you that it does make sense...the problem lies in trying to implement something like this. I mean, the appeal board (or whatever it's called) would be over-whelmed with complaints. I just don't see a fair way of taxing the burbs.
Things that I think would make Calgary more livable:
- Build some sort of mini central business districts in the burbs. Maybe one per quadrant. I was in Dallas a few weeks ago and saw this first hand. It works really well, although I admit Dallas is a way different place than Calgary. I could swear I heard talk about this a few years ago, but haven't seen anything concrete.
- Upgrade sports and arts facilities.
- Give some love to the industrial areas of the city in the form of access to and from them. Hopefully, find a way to get all of the big trucks off the main roads. All the talk here has been about downtown, but I am sure a large chunk of the population works in the industrial parts of town.
- City hall needs to help promote our festivals and try to attract world class events. Things like Cari-fest, for example. I don't see why there isn't something big happening in the city almost every weekend in the summer at least.