Dear Editor:
Wanna know what it’s like to be a second-class citizen? Try being a senior citizen or a disabled person after a snowstorm.
I saw old women with canes and walkers trying to navigate icy sidewalks or walking on the plowed streets trying to avoid the cars. In front of the medical building on Fifth Avenue between Sixth and Seven streets, there’s a wheelchair ramp to get into the building, but to get from the car dropping you off, to it, you have to climb a snowbank on the edge of the sidewalk with your cane or walker. A wheelchair is impossible.
Meanwhile, the city plows the lanes that able- bodied bike riders use and only the streets that vehicle commuters (from non-New Westminster taxpayers in Surrey, Langley, or the Tri-Cities) use, to get to and from Vancouver, are plowed. We who pay the taxes for services like garbage pick-up and road and sidewalk clearing etc. are literally left out in the cold.
And many citizens and businesses do not clear their sidewalks for pedestrians. Has anyone ever been fined for not complying with the sidewalk clearing rule? The soft approach of trying to “educate people” about the rules has not worked. It’s time for a little awareness and enforcement around access for everyone, not just the able-bodied with cars.
Camille Dunphy, New Westminster
