Port Coquitlam will lobby the provincial government for an extension of the Evergreen Line as part of the 30- to 40-year Master Transportation Plan (MTP) council approved Tuesday.
A lack of rapid transit to the municipality is a significant barrier to achieving the city's goals of increasing non-auto transportation from 14% to 25% over the next three to four decades, the document said.
Dave Currie, PoCo's manager of transportation, told The Tri-City News that working with neighbouring municipalities, regional government and the province is crucial to the plan's success.
"We have engaged with those service providers - TransLink, the [Ministry of Transportation and Infrastructure] - throughout this process," he said. "They have been part of our advisory group and... we have engaged with them in the development of this plan."
An Evergreen Line extension is not the only plank in the plan that will require co-operation from higher levels of government.
The expansion of West Coast Express service to off-peak hours and weekends and the implementation of rapid bus service along the Lougheed Highway corridor are important components of the plan that will require provincial funding.
Upgrades to the Mary Hill Bypass, a provincial highway, are also called for in the MTP in anticipation of an increase in vehicle traffic due to improvements along Highway 1.
Working with municipal neighbours will also be required in order for PoCo's transportation plan to be successful. A key plank in the document is the construction of a Coquitlam River crossing at Lincoln Avenue, an initiative that would be funded by the city of Coquitlam.
But there are short- and medium-terms components of the MTP that the city can enact on its own.
Land use decisions are key, Currie said, noting that four neighbourhood centres have been identified as core commercial and mixed-use areas: downtown, Westwood, the Dominion Triangle and the north side.
Building compact communities will make residents in those areas less reliant on automobiles, he said, adding that improving neighbourhood walkability is also a priority outlined in the MTP that the city can address on its own. The plan calls for expanding sidewalk coverage, starting with high-traffic areas and expanding to other parts of the city over the course of the plan. Much of the cost, Currie notes, would be taken on by developers.
Several bike connections have also been identified in the MTP, including a trail from Wilson Avenue to Broadway Street that would connect the bike lane crossing the Coast Meridian Overpass with PoCo's downtown via a trail along Kingsway Avenue. A signed bike route along Fraser Avenue, a new tunnel under the Shaughnessy Street underpass and a downtown-to-Westwood Street bicycle route are also identified as priorities in the plan.
