New Westminster’s medical health officer says a Yes win in the upcoming transit referendum could boost the city’s health more than many of the drugs doctors prescribe.
Dr. Lisa Mu, whose job is to promote health among the residents of New West and Burnaby and protect them from health risks, came out in support of the Yes side this week.
“This is one of the most critical decisions that we can make for public health in the Lower Mainland probably for this decade and probably many more to come actually,” she told the Record.
In New West, Mu said the biggest transportation-related health challenge facing local residents are the 450,000 vehicles streaming through the city daily.
“They don’t have an origin or a destination in New Westminster,” she said, “and that has huge negative impacts for the health of that community: congestion, air pollution, longer commute times. We know that people who spend more time commuting in their cars are less likely to engage with their communities and they have lower levels of social connectedness, which is really important for health and well-being.”
Approval of the proposed $7.5-billion transportation plan and a new 0.5 per cent regional sales tax to help fund it would mean a new, four-lane, tolled Patullo Bridge, 50 per cent more service on the Expo Line, doubling of Millenium-Line service, new all-day service every 15 minutes on Eighth Avenue and more frequent peak service on 12th Street.
It would also help reduce New West traffic congestion by increasing rapid rail south of the Fraser.
All that would be good for the health of the local population, Mu said.
She said she decided to speak out this week because the campaign is at a critical point and she has come to realize most people don’t associate transportation with health.
“I want residents to have the opportunity to consider all of the facts before they make a decision,” Mu said.
Beside the negative health impacts of traffic congestion (air pollution, stress and community disconnectedness), Mu is urging residents to consider the health benefits of making transit better.
“A bus trip is really an interrupted walking trip,” she said as an example. “People walk to the bus stop, they walk to the SkyTrain and then they walk at the other end. People who take transit to work are not going to be driving to go somewhere for lunch. They’re going to be walking for their errands, walking for lunch during the day, and these are all steps that accumulate over the course of the day. Then, over the course of months to years, we see huge differences.”
Transit users in the Lower Mainland are twice as likely to walk 30 minutes a day and more likely to meet daily activity recommendations than non-transit users, according to a study last year cited by Mu.
“That has huge benefits in terms of chronic disease prevention and in terms of mental health and well-being,” she said.
For Mu, who walks, cycles, takes transit and drives to get around, the upcoming plebiscite is not about TransLink, but a No win would delay what she calls “critically needed transportation improvements.”
“I think that there’s been a lot of conversation about the politics,” she said, “and I think that folks really deserve to hear what some of the facts are, and I think that as a medical health officer, I have a responsibility to speak up on issues that I think are really important for the health of my communities and for the health of the region.”
