City of whitehorse (Vic) council sustainable transport

We (the LBS I'm working p/t at) had a visit today from the new City of
Whitehorse sustainable transport person - a very enthusiastic woman who
seems pretty keen to get more people riding (and ... she has a Trek, so
has decent taste ...) around these parts.

Just a bit of good news, I guess. She's looking at ways to encourage
cycling in and around Box Hill etc, and they're having some sort of a
sustainable transport expo thing at Box Hill 'soon', where she asked us
if we had any suggestions & ideas for bikes etc to display - we might
show off a functional tricycle or a 'bent or something else interesting.

truly amazing. WHCC now dedicates 3 salaries, plus a $50K 'strategy'
(that outlines how they will only spend others' money) to people
talking about riding bikes and yet they wont spend a cent on actually
DOING anything.

the words 'case' and 'basket' come to mind


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flyingdutch

flyingdutch wrote:
truly amazing. WHCC now dedicates 3 salaries, plus a $50K 'strategy'
(that outlines how they will only spend others' money) to people
talking about riding bikes and yet they wont spend a cent on actually
DOING anything.

the words 'case' and 'basket' come to mind

What you know now about politics, compromise and reality, would
hopefully allow you to maybe have a little patience. She seemed
genuine to me, and was trying to make a real difference. I'm not
holding my breath, but at the same time, will be watching for if
anything interesting happens. At least they're thinking about it.

Bleve Wrote:

What you know now about politics, compromise and reality, would
hopefully allow you to maybe have a little patience. She seemed
genuine to me, and was trying to make a real difference. I'm not
holding my breath, but at the same time, will be watching for if
anything interesting happens. At least they're thinking about it.

I concur, these issues can take time for local councils to get their
heads around, especially in suburbs where some peoples legs seem to be
painted on. Not everyone lives in the (reasonably) bike-friendly inner
'burbs. Good to know Whitehorse have a Sustainable transport officer,
our local one is fantastic and we're both off to do some *stuff*
tomorrow arvo.


--
cfsmtb

Bleve Wrote:

What you know now about politics, compromise and reality, would
hopefully allow you to maybe have a little patience. She seemed
genuine to me, and was trying to make a real difference. I'm not
holding my breath, but at the same time, will be watching for if
anything interesting happens. At least they're thinking about it.

Nuffin against her. unfortunately many of the council STO's are given
little 'teeth' and so get stuck in a scenario where the 'real' traffic
peoplez get to ignore them. There's a few great ones out there, mainly
the ones who have had a predecessor who cracked it and thus council
learnt to give the role some 'grunt'. I hope she does make a diff, and
yes it is good they are thinking about it. Then again, their 'open
spaces' person has a policy of not leaving the office to do site visits
(presumably to avoid those nasty open spaces!). They also
have 'COWBAG' advisory committee that council have had for many years
and summarily ignored all/most recommendations from them.


--
flyingdutch

Hi
I haven't ridden Whitehorse Road between Box Hill and Surrey Hills for
a while. If I recall correctly, the bike lane had to give way to all of
the side streets. Maybe somebody could talk to the council to get that
fixed.
Cheers
Dave