Mayor-elect Doug McCallum today said that on the commitment that matters most to Newton, SkyTrain down King George Boulevard, the Conservative Party of BC has committed to deliver, while the NDP has offered Newton a conversation.
Newton is the largest community in Surrey, with more people than most cities in British Columbia, and it has no rapid transit. Surrey is the fastest-growing city in the province, adding roughly a thousand residents a month, and for many years the governments in Victoria and Ottawa that decide where rapid transit gets built have left Newton off the map. Residents have been told their turn would come. They are still waiting.
Today Conservative Leader Lorne Doerkson committed a Conservative government to fund and build SkyTrain along King George Boulevard to Newton Town Centre with Ottawa, on time and on budget. The NDP’s answer, in the Premier’s own words on Sunday, was that he welcomes “that conversation” and is glad to sit down with the City, the Prime Minister, TransLink and the Mayors’ Council “to talk about what it would take.” A commitment to build is not the same as a willingness to talk.
“Surrey is the fastest-growing city in British Columbia and Newton is its largest community, and for years it has been underserved by transit and neglected by the governments that decide where rapid transit gets built. Newton has been promised its turn for as long as I can remember,” said McCallum. “This week one party committed to build SkyTrain to Newton, and the other offered a meeting. Newton has been in meetings for years. It needs a commitment, and it needs shovels.”
McCallum, who worked with provincial and federal governments of every stripe to deliver SkyTrain to Fleetwood, Clayton Heights and Cloverdale, said the City’s part will be ready the day the new council is sworn in. Surrey will decide the route down King George Boulevard and issue the permits, the same way it did for the line now under construction to Langley. What Surrey needs from Victoria is a government that has already said yes.
“I have built SkyTrain in this city before, and I know what a yes looks like. It is a commitment with a route, a partner in Victoria and Ottawa and a timeline, and that is what the Conservatives have put on paper for Newton,” McCallum said. “I will work with whichever government Surrey elects on Saturday. But residents deserve to know the difference between a commitment and a conversation, and on SkyTrain to Newton, only one party has made a commitment.”
Image source: https://www.translink.ca/news/media-resources
