Transportation Minister Kevin Falcon said this week that new recommendations for TransLink to incorporate Sea to Sky communities will only come into effect if corridor municipalities want to be included in TransLink.
"This will not happen unless and until the local municipalities decide it's in their best interest to make this happen," Falcon told The Whistler Question on Monday (March 12).
Falcon's comments came on the heels of last week's announcement following recommendations of an independent review of TransLink's structure, commissioned by the Province.
One of the recommendations is to expand service to include communities in the Fraser Valley up to Pemberton - a holistic approach to transit that's necessary to achieve the government's aggressive environmental targets, he said.
Mayor Ian Sutherland said he's still waiting to see what the changes would mean in Squamish, but feels hopeful the restructuring is "more good than bad" for the municipality.
"It could be very good news for us, it all depends on the details," said Sutherland. "Certainly, we've taking with Whistler and the SLRD about regional transit. This gets us probably closer to that model because it was hard to get traction as a corridor transit system."
Sutherland also said it could mean better local service as well.
"Being part of a bigger system, it might be economies could be worked out."
Falcon said TransLink will likely start negotiations to incorporate communities such as Abbotsford, Chilliwack and Mission first.
When negotiations do begin, it's likely that all Sea to Sky communities would negotiate together for the entire region, he said. It wouldn't make much sense for one or two communities to opt into TransLink if others chose not to, and Sutherland agreed.
"The idea of a mayors' council I think is a good one," he said. "It gets the different leaders of communities at one table, which is probably a positive thing."
The new governance model will allow one vote for every 20,000 people, which means Squamish would have a three-quarter vote, and Whistler half a vote.
Whistler Mayor Ken Melamed said more details are needed on what Whistler's options would be, but his initial response to last week's announcement is concern about Whistler's unique transit needs - such as its free Village shuttle - and the lack of local control if Whistler chose to opt into such a large transit authority.
Higher bus fares in Whistler would go against the current council's commitment to keep fares low as an affordability measure, said Melamed, and people likely wouldn't respond well to higher property taxes.
"I think the Province collects enough tax as it is," he said.
Sutherland said Squamish would also wait on the benefit to cost ratio.
"It comes down to the basic questions of value, what we're going to end up paying for it, what we're going to get in return for that money."
