How would your life change if you walked or biked more? Your health might improve, it would be better for the environment, and socially you will be more engaged with your surroundings. Sounds like a worthwhile decision – right? However, the downside is "convenience". Can we find a balance between the convenience of our cars and the benefits of biking and walking?

What if we created a rule of thumb? For example, any car trip that is 5 minutes or less – you walk or ride? A five minute car drive would equal a 10 minute bike ride or a 20 minute walk. I think for most trips this is a fair trade off. If you are going to the grocery store for a few items why not take a knapsack to carry your purchase home, why not ride your bikes to your children’s dance lesson, baseball, softball or lacrosse game? Why not ride or walk to church? How about school – I don’t understand why we continue to drive our kids to schools if they are less than a five minute walk. We are teaching our children the convenient lifestyle of a car-oriented society.

I can hear all the feedback now – I realize that everyone has unique requirements; you have kids going in different directions and work schedules. I understand the challenges; we had the same effects on our life when we decided to become a one car family and use our bikes more, and for me to take public transit.

Based on our experience the challenge of convenience can be overcome. I will admit that it takes more work and pre-planning; however, it is achievable. We leave a little earlier for the softball game or church. We all take knapsacks with us when we go grocery shopping. Overall, we spend more time together as a family and enjoy the commute together. Seems like a good lifestyle change.

I suggest you give it a try, what do you have to lose?

I have always loved biking; this started as a kid growing up in PoCo and riding my bike to school. As I grew up I continued to ride my bike - to Douglas College then to SFU. Over the years I have continued to ride my bike to work and with my family. I will never forget the cycling ‘holiday’ Erin and I took by riding the Oregon Coast. Now as Mayor I enjoy riding my bike around the community, not only as a good way to get around but also to provide leadership. However, the downside is riding in a suit on a hot spring or summer day can be extremely uncomfortable.

So, I called my friends Glenn and Kelly at Westwood Cycle (Caps) to help with a solution. My dilemma is not unique.  Glenn told me stories from other urban areas around the world, and how to make it more effective for someone to commute by bike while wearing a suit. The solution: e-Bike, an electrical assist bike.

The basis concept is the bike is equipped with an electric engine that assists the riding as they are peddling. The electric engine is not like a motorcycle, the rider still needs to pedal.

This is a great solution.  I have been commuting on my new bike over the past 6 weeks. The outcome: excellent! I have an easy commute wearing a suit and arrive at my destination comfortable.

Stay tuned, I will provide you with a continued update over time.

Greg

PS: There is one other aspect of my new e-bike that is essential. The bike is equipped with puncture resistant tires and self healing tire tubes. Last week I had two flat tires and both times the flats were fixed themselves and I was able to keep riding to my destination. I did not break stride, it was phenomenal. I recommend these tubes for anyone who commutes.

What would you do if you and your family were cut off from emergency services, stores for food, or communications for 48 hours? What if…

This is always the question.  The City spends a large amount of time and energy to be prepared and offer ways for you to learn more, and we have a spectacular group of Emergency Preparedness volunteers; however, there is only so much your government can do. It will be up to the residents to be prepared.

In our house we have a safe exit plan, a meeting location and an earthquake emergency supplies kit, which will help us with clean drinking water, first aid and food. Here is a video on preparing a kit.  Are you prepared?

The City wants to work with you so you are ready. Come down to our Emergency Preparedness Program on May 8^th at 5pm in the parking lot off Wilson and Shaughnessy (behind A&W). Here is what you can learn:

Booths at the EP display on May 8 will cover information such as:

• how to be prepared at home and in your workplace,

• preparing for your pets,

• how schools can get prepared,

• the City’s Emergency Social Services Program, and

• the City’s Emergency Communications Program.

Information will also be available about the free emergency preparedness courses offered to Port Coquitlam residents five times a year. The next round of courses takes place in May; all start at 7 p.m. and are offered at the #1 Fire Hall at 1725 Broadway Street and include:

• Personal Family Preparedness – May 11

• Rapid Damage Assessment – May 13

• Basic Fire Suppression – May 18

• Light Urban Search and Rescue – May 20

More information about the courses and other EP information are available at www.portcoquitlam.ca/ep or by calling 604.927.5466.

I am proud to be Canadian. I have made this statement over the years, both at home and abroad. However, these Olympics seemed to allow us to stand on our soap box and yell from the top of our lungs about how proud we are of our athletes, our uniqueness and our country. From the opening to the closing ceremonies everyone involved embraced these games and used the experience to tell the world about our great region, province and country.

The Canadian pride started with the torch relay, it was as if the torch painted a red and white streak of pride over our country. In Port Coquitlam, there were over 10,000 people who lined the streets at Leigh Square for a glimpse of the torch; here is a brief video. What a moment, I was proud to be a Canadian in Port Coquitlam. The next day was the opening ceremonies; it was filled with Canadiana – there are too many wonderful moments to mention. However, the poet Shane Koyczan’s poem ‘We Are More’ was inspirational; it helped me define why I am proud to be Canadian – view Shane reciting the poem here.

As a family we took full advantage of the games. Although we did not have any tickets to medal events, we went to medal ceremonies, hung out downtown, gathered with friends to watch the Games on TV. As a family we embraced the experience, it will live in our memories forever. We had a wonderful time watching the semi-final men’s hockey game at the Swiss House; watching Clara Hughes win bronze at the Yaletown Live site; and walking the streets with thousands of other proud Canadians.

There is much talk about how the hosting of the Olympics can plant an Olympic seed in our young athletes. Clara Hughes commented, “The Olympic… began in 1988 when she caught her first glimpse of the Winter Games on Television. Watching speed skaters glide around the oval inspired her to believe that one day she, too, could represent Canada in that same sport.” Madison was able to go to Whistler with her Ski Club to watch the Women’s GS. When she came home she was on top of the world, the team was able to stretch with the skiers before their race. For her this was an unforgettable Olympic moment, maybe it will be the moment that changes her life.

In Port Coquitlam, our Spirit Committee  did an amazing job to create experiences and legacies for our community. As I mentioned before, the torch run was an overwhelming success, all the community events were at capacity and many people came to PoCo Zone 2010 at the Rec Centre to watch the games on the large screen. The Port Coquitlam Spirit Community did such a wonderful job that VANOC named Port Coquitlam a Live Site.

The atmosphere in Port Coquitlam, Vancouver, and across our country was electric. Thank you John Furlong and the VANCOC team (BTW, John’s closing speech captured what most of us are thinking, here is a link . Thank You to the over 25,000 volunteers, Thank You athletes and coaches who performed so well and demonstrated sportsmanship, Thank You to Canada who came together for a 17 day celebration of our country and demonstrated to the world, we live in the best place on earth.

My words can not do justice to the experience; here is a photo collage of our Olympic experience. 

I am reading a very interesting book by Mark Freedman titled: Hot, Flat and Crowded . The book reviews how the global society has evolved into a planet that has an increasing temperature, is connected on global scale through information and transportation infrastructure and is combined with an increase in population. Freedman argues that the world is ‘virtually’ shrinking due to increased mobility and information sharing through the World Wide Web. Here is a link to an excerpt of the book , definitely worth a read.

On Sunday night at the family dinner table we had an excellent discussion about the impacts of a global community. Our 11 year old daughter does not know life without this global connection. Her school is a picture of our global community, products on our store shelves are from all over the world and the information comes from all corners of our planet. There is an increased sense of comfort knowing at some level we are all connected. It reminds me of the movie with Will Smith, Six Degrees of Separation . There is a line in the movie that basically says that it is comforting to know that everyone in the world is so closely connected but at the same time can be frustrating to understand. I believe that due to mobility and the internet we are a lot closer than ever before and we rely on each other to a larger degree than we can comprehend.

However, this higher, broader outreach comes at a cost – the environment. Although we can use new technology to help us communicate without snail mail and gas-based communications, on the flipside reporting and other advancements have helped us become better stewards of the environment. Conversely, we are now consuming goods from all over the world which need to be transported here. Due to the relatively low cost of goods movement and the cheap labour costs to produce the goods there is a good business model for globalization but the model does not include environmental consideration. At the dinner table we discussed the trade-offs we as a family and community need to make on a daily basis. I suggested we run a family experiment, for the month of February we are going to attempt to not purchase anything made in China.

Why China? China is the symbolic poster child for the new global economy and the flat world we live in. We did not choose China because we don’t enjoy their products or appreciate their involvement in the global community. We chose China for the symbolic nature.

When we were making this decision, our daughter was very concerned, as she had been saving up to buy some books through a school program. We presumed that the books were made in China, after a passionate discussion I asked our daughter to bring to the table 5 books she recently read, to determine where the books are printed.

To our surprise not one of the books was made in China, four from the USA and one from Singapore. More learning for all of us.

So, starting February 1^st we started a journal, we will write down the date, item we wished to purchase and how we overcame the obstacle of not purchasing products made in China. I think this will be a very informative experiment which will allow our family to better understand how we are affected by a global economy.

I will report back in March, stay tuned.

As a follow up to my last Blog post, below are my comments I made to the community recapping 2009 and looking forward to 2010. Last year was an opportunity for a new Council to establish a working relationship and develop a new corporate culture. This is not an area that can be easily measured; however, you can see the difference between a Council that works together and one that does not. I believe our Council has come together and established ourselves as a good Council that places the community’s best interests first. There are many signs of a group that works well with each other; focus, integrity, respect, and a little humour. I believe that this Council demonstrates each of these traits, which makes each of our jobs more enjoyable.

Greg Moore – 2009 – 2010 Comments

This year, we’ve decided to combine our year-in-review for 2009 with a look at what’s coming up in 2010. You’ll see that we’ve organized the projects into categories to show how we’re working to meet your priorities and serve you better.

This is not intended to be a comprehensive list of everything we did in 2009, but rather a list of highlights.

More information about any of these initiatives is available on our website.

Let’s start with some of the things we did in 2009 to make our community safer.

• You might have heard about our Public Safety Inspection Team, which works with the RCMP to inspect homes suspected of harbouring marijuana grow operations in our community. In 2009, the team inspected 31 properties and closed down 13 of the sites for remediation. Their work helps reduce the significant public safety hazards associated with grow operations, such as fire, electrocution, health hazards and violence.

• We also helped fund nine new RCMP officers in 2009.

• And to address the community’s escalating bear problem, the City introduced measures in 2009 such as a Bear Aware public education program and new bear regulations to our Solid Waste Bylaw. The regulations included requirements to secure garbage and other bear attractants, and to keep waste carts off the street overnight. The measures appear to be working. In 2008, there were more than 900 bear sightings in Port Coquitlam, while in 2009 there were fewer than half of that number. I want to mention that a lot of the credit for this success goes to the residents and businesses who participated in our efforts.

• Seasonal flooding along the Coquitlam River is an ongoing threat, and in 2009 we finalized an agreement with BC Hydro and other stakeholders for seasonal flow reductions from the Coquitlam Dam. This will help reduce the risk of the river flooding in Port Coquitlam at peak flow times.

• As part of our ongoing Emergency Preparedness work, we held an Emergency Social Services drill to provide our volunteers with a hands-on opportunity to work together and to practice their skills in setting up and managing reception centres.

A complete community is a healthy community. To help meet our goal of increasing participation by 20% by 2010, we opened a Healthy Resource Centre at Hyde Creek Recreation Centre, as well as an outdoor fitness circuit at Gates Park that is free and accessible to people of all ages and physical abilities.

• In February, we were honoured to host the provincial launch of Spirit Week in the final year before the Olympics.

• And later in the year, we responded to a long-time need in our community by starting the development of the City’s first dog off-leash park in Shaughnessy Park.

• One of my priorities when I became Mayor was to strengthen our City’s relationship with our neighbours, the Kwikwetlem First Nation. I’m happy to say that in 2009 we did succeed in building a stronger relationship with Chief Ron Giesbrecht and his Council that will serve both of our communities well in the future. .

• Another focus for us in 2009 was homelessness, which is becoming a growing issue in Port Coquitlam and across the Lower Mainland. In 2009 our City supported the efforts of the Mayor’s Action Team on Homelessness in developing a strategy to permanently end chronic homelessness by 2014.

• To help us properly manage our community’s heritage assets, we engaged Don Luxton Consultants to help us develop our first Heritage Strategic Plan. We engaged the community in this process with online and hard-copy surveys, displays at community events and a community workshop.

Transportation has long been a top priority for our citizens.

• One project that will significantly help improve transportation in our City is the Coast Meridian Overpass, which reach the 95% completion stage at the end of 2009. The CMO is the City’s largest-ever transportation infrastructure project, and it’s been amazing to watch this impressive structure take shape over the CP Railway Yards. We received grants worth more than $63 million for the CMO from TransLink and the Provincial Government, which significantly reduced the impact of the project on local taxpayers.

• We also obtained federal and provincial infrastructure grants worth more than $7.5 million for the Broadway Street Reconstruction Project. This project will complement the CMO project and bring Broadway up to full arterial standards, including four travel lanes, a centre turn lane and marked bicycle lanes. The tender process for the work was also completed in 2009.

The environment is a top priority for our citizens and for the City. We received a significant amount of attention both locally and regionally for our waste-reduction efforts in 2009, which included:

• Expanding our Kitchen Waste Collection Program to include all food scraps and food-soiled papers – making Port Coquitlam the first City in the Lower Mainland to take this step.

• We also conducted studies and planning for the introduction of alternate-week garbage collection in 2010 to further reduce what our community is sending to the landfill. Again, we’ll be the first City in Metro Vancouver to take this necessary step.

• To help define our priorities to achieve our environmental goals, we engaged the firm HB Lanarc in 2009 to develop our first Environmental Strategic Plan – also known as EnviroPlan. This process included surveys and an environmental forum to collect public input.

• We also received recognition from the Union of BC Municipalities for Community Leadership and Innovation, for our requirement that all new large-format buildings have green roofs. Sysco will be the first company to build a green roof, which essentially involves installing vegetation and soil over top of a waterproof membrane.

We also made improvements to how we work and provide services to the community in 2009.

• For example, our switch to Voice-Over Internet Protocol phone system will not only save money but help us communicate better with other staff and with the public.

• We also spent time developing a long-range outlook of City finances in order to better plan for the future.

• As well, we improved our communications with the public by updating our City website, and by enhancing our use of social media, including Facebook, Twitter and a new Mayor’s blog. In 2009 we experienced a 100% increase in Facebook fans, bringing our numbers to 1,200, as well as a 75% increase in subscriptions to our E-Update email newsletters, bringing that number to 920. Our success using social media as a communications tool has earned Port Coquitlam recognition from other cities.

2009 was certainly a busy and productive year, and 2010 promises to be the same.

• To assist our community in preparing for disasters, we’ll be assisting Health Canada later this month with warehousing Casualty Collection Unit medical equipment for use if a major disaster strikes. We’re also applying to warehouse equipment for an Emergency 200-bed Hospital from the federal National Emergency Stockpile.

• A grant from the National Fire Protection Association will allow us to implement a fire and fall prevention program called Remembering When, which targets older adults. We hope to start working with Fraser Health this year to implement the program.

• One of our significant planning efforts this year will be to engage the community in developing a new Corporate Strategic Plan. This plan will re-establish the community’s priorities and set the City on a path to achieve them.

• Other efforts to build a complete community will include expediting development of the Dominion Triangle area to increase City revenues and create quality jobs.• We’ll also complete the Heritage Strategic Plan this year, and upgrade the exterior of Hyde Creek Recreation Centre, with the help of grant funding.

• On the final point, for the last couple of years we have been working with community partners representing community sport, the School District and business, to develop a comprehensive Sport Strategy that covers recreational, community and school sports. The strategy aims to enhance the quality of sport in Port Coquitlam. In 2010, we plan to complete and begin to implement this strategy.

• It’s been a long time coming, but the Coast Meridian Overpass will be open for business this March. The CMO will provide a much needed third link between the two sides of our community, improving mobility and access not only locally but throughout the region. Keep an eye on our website, Facebook and local newspapers for details about the grand opening on March 6.

• Other transportation projects this year will include completion of phase 1 for the Broadway Street Reconstruction Project – bringing Broadway up to three lanes – as well as completion of the Fremont Connector study with Coquitlam.

• Alternate-week garbage pick-up for households who receive City waste collection services will begin on January 14. We’ll continue to provide information and resources to residents to assist them during the transition. Ultimately, switching to this new schedule will potentially help divert an additional 2,400 tonnes of household waste from the landfill each year, as well as save taxpayers $225,000 over five years.

• Our other efforts to help the environment this year will include completing our Environmental Strategic Plan, and identifying more opportunities for energy and water conservation in our City. For example, we’ll be trying out LED street lights in our downtown and looking for more ways to promote water conservation.

• We’ll continue to develop our long-term financial plan this year, with input from the community.

• And as part of our ongoing efforts to find the best staff to provide our City services, we’ll be launching new Open4Hire software this year that will allow City job applicants to apply online and maintain an online profile for future job opportunities.

This is just a sampling of the initiatives and exciting work that is happening in your City.

For more information about what’s happening at the City of Port Coquitlam, visit our website regularly or visit the City Info tent at civic events.