Jennifer Smith

Here is my letter in response to Stephanie Hounsell's op-ed in last week's Champion, "Can we find a balance between old and new Milton?"

Dear Editor,

In last Thursday's issue of the Champion, Stephanie Hounsell spoke of the importance of finding a balance between 'old' and 'new' Milton. I couldn't agree more. Unfortunately, too many people see that balance as an either/or proposition where gains in one part of town must inevitably lead to losses in another.

I would like to challenge that perception.

Milton has a population of over 80,000, but we still have a downtown designed for 30,000. That's bad for everyone. Having a vibrant, well-defined centre is what makes us a town and not a suburb, but if that centre is dispersed, or it's growth doesn't keep pace with growth in the rest of town, new residents have no reason to go there and interact with the rest of the community, and the whole town loses out.

So when people in 'old' Milton speak out about losing their services and businesses, they aren't just complaining about having to travel a little further to the library or the grocery store. They are pointing out a fundamental imbalance in the way Milton has been growing - an imbalance that affects all of Milton, old and new.

The new intensification plan and the Main Street underpass should begin to remedy this by expanding what we think of as downtown and making better connections between the east and west ends of Main Street. But we need to retain the facilities and services we have until growth in Milton's core can catch up with development in the rest of town.

That's not just good for the people who live in central Milton - it's good for all of us.

My very first batch of campaign literature came back from the printer today, and it looks great! Big thanks to Steve at Harris Stationary for the fine job.

More importantly, having something to hand out plus warm weather can only mean one thing...

It's Door Knocking Season!

(click to download)

I'm really looking forward to meeting all of you. See you soon!

The Milton Champion published an article on Tuesday about the women running in this year's municipal election. Most of the quotes were from Wendy Schau who (sadly) will not be running for re-election this year. They also spoke to Jan Mowbray, Cindy Lunau, and myself.

It was a pretty good article all in all, but I can't help but feel a little... ambivalent about it.

I've always been wary of making broad generalizations along gender lines, particularly when it comes to politics. Any time you try to say something about what women or men are "typically" like, you will immediately be contradicted by endless examples men and women who aren't like that at all. Personally, I've never considered myself "typical", as a woman or in any other way, and I'm sure most other women - and men - feel the same way.

Still, Wendy Schau made an excellent point: women can bring a different perspective because their life experience is often different from men's. And the broader range of life experience we have on council, the better its members can represent the people of Milton.

I'm also discovering that, as I said in the article, many women do seem to be more focused on getting value in the form of services for their tax dollars instead of just on the amount of money being spent. I don't know why, unless it's some holdover from the days when men earned the money and women did the daily purchasing. Or maybe it's some instinctive impulse to think in the long term to ensure that one's children can...

Ugh.. no. You see? This is why I hate questions like that.

The fact is, I never even thought about the male/female ratio on Council when I decided to run. Sure, when Melanie asked me if I thought that decisions might be made differently if there were more women on Council, I agreed with her. How would they not? But it certainly isn't something I spend a lot of time thinking about, and I wouldn't automatically assume that those decisions would necessarily be better.

That said, I do see a difference in approach between our male and female council members, and I do find myself agreeing with the women more often than not. But I suspect that has more to do with their individual personalities than with their gender.

As for my personality, I can tell you this: I have a talent for problem-solving, and for helping others to find common ground and consensus. I have no patience for drama. I am pragmatic and non-ideological, and I am happy to use an idea from anywhere and anyone if it will help bring about the desired result.

I have no idea if any of that makes me a "typical" woman, but I do believe that it will make me an effective councillor.

About twelve years ago, I got myself a part-time typesetting job up near Martin and Steeles. My husband was commuting to Toronto every day and we only had one car, but it wasn't a problem because there was a bus stop right across the street from my house. It ran straight up Commercial Street, crossed Main, and went up Martin to Steeles. My commute was less than ten minutes.

That was the last time I sat on a Milton bus.

Let me be clear: I love public transit. I grew up in Toronto where transit is simply a way of life. Even now I prefer to take the GO bus or train to Toronto rather than drive - but within Milton there just isn't anywhere I want to go that is easily accessible on the bus any more.

The difference is, transit routes in large cities are quick, convenient, and easy to understand. In smaller, lower-density towns like Milton, routes are inevitably circuitous, inconvenient, and nearly impossible to navigate. All of which leads to a familiar catch-22: low service levels discourage ridership, and low ridership discourages municipalities from improving service.

Happily, all that is starting to change here in Milton.

On March 8th, Milton Transit started its contract with PW Transit, a Western Canada-based school and municipal bus service provider experienced in serving mid-sized towns like Milton. The change means new buses, new drivers, and the beginnings of a whole new route system.

The first stage of this transformation is a new rush hour bus route that runs through the Scott Boulevard neighbourhood on the east side of town. This is a welcome development for the residents down there who are already cut off from the rest of town by construction and the level rail crossing over Derry Road.

The buses themselves have several distinct advantages over the old ones. The most obvious is the wide door and low floor, which make it a breeze getting strollers and carts on and off. They also have bike racks on the front, and will eventually have GPS tracking so you can tell exactly where your bus is and when it will arrive.

But the new buses and the Scott Express route are only the beginning. Starting in September, a whole new route system will be implemented - one which starts to transition away from the loop system we have now to a more sensible grid-based, two-way route system. Which means that you won't have to take a driving tour of Milton just to get from one end of Main Street to the other.

The whole plan was presented at an open house on Wednesday, complete with maps and detailed service standards. Unfortunately none of that is available online yet (soon), but here's a photo of the current version of the proposed route map, and a separate one of the new Downtown Route 2:





Yes - Ward 2 residents will now be able to get to the movie theatre and the Wal-Mart on just one bus!

We still have quite a ways to go. To start, we need to extend the east end routes past the GO station through to downtown along Main, and more needs to be done to coordinate with the GO train schedule. Still, it's worlds better than what we have now.

And to think it very nearly didn't pass the vote on council.

In honour of the first day of service for the new buses and the new Scott route, I took a ride with Ward 8 Council candidate Zeeshan Hamid. Zeeshan serves on the Transit Advisory Committee so he takes particular pride in this new route, which practically stops at his front door. Lucky guy. We had a nice chat along the way, mostly about the differences between his neighbourhood and mine, their relative advantages and disadvantages, and what the old and new areas of Milton can learn and gain from each other.

I also took a ride to the GO station on the current Route 2 bus, which is the closest to my house. I still have to walk several blocks to Main and Martin to catch it, and in the time it takes for it to wind around the entire perimeter of town to the GO station I could probably have walked there.

September can't come soon enough.