So, there’s going to be an apartment building on Cleveland Avenue that does not include parking spots. Judging from the reaction, you might think council had voted to outlaw and physically remove all parking altogether. This very newspaper thinks council’s decision puts us all on the road to hell, no less. [Editorial: Is Squamish ready for car-free living?, published July 26.]
Wait, hell? Like, lakes of fire and eternal torment and wailing and gnashing of teeth and stuff— that hell? I’d like to suggest that might be just a little overly dramatic.
Yes, Squamish is largely a car-dependent town. Yes, most people use their vehicles daily—to drive to work, shuttle the kids around, access recreation, haul gravel, whatever. Fair enough.
But—and it’s a big “but”—there are also people in Squamish who are not car dependent. Believe it or not, there are even people in Squamish who don’t own cars. Why should those people have to pay for parking spots for cars they don’t own? Why shouldn’t there be housing options available for those people, options that don’t have parking costs baked into the rent, the mortgage, the strata fees, the property taxes? Seriously, why not?
And if—out of fairness if nothing else—we’re going to allow people who don’t own cars to live in housing that doesn’t force them to pay for parking spots for cars they don’t own, where better than on Cleveland Avenue, where groceries and banks and parks and doctors and dentists and various other shops and services are all within easy walking distance?
If this building was proposed for Paradise Valley or the Highlands or somewhere up Nine-Mile way, you can bet I would have some questions. But it’s smack in the middle of downtown, the perfect location for it, so I don’t see the problem.
If most people in Squamish need or want to pay for parking as part of their housing costs, they can. There are several thousand housing units in Squamish that, one way or another, include parking in the cost, so take your pick. There are many more currently in the planning or building stages, and there will be still many more in the years to come.
The fact that a mere 20 downtown apartments will not force their occupants to pay for parking spots for cars they may not even own is not going to put anyone on the road to hell so, everybody, maybe just calm down a little.
Murray Sovereign
Squamish
