To the editor,
Re: Walkway used to be in better shape, Letters, Nov. 28.
I have not been down to the walkway for a while, but occurs to me that if someone is commenting publically via your letters page then it must be obvious.
Also in the same edition is a front-page article headed Draft budget calls for tax hike of 2.6 per cent, part of this increase being the expansion of the waterfront walkway.
It would seem to me that if the existing infrastrucure cannot be maintained at its present size then any good business manager would see the folly in spending any further funds to expand said infrastructure. Especially at the size of some of the numbers I have seen published for the possible cost.
- RELATED: Draft plan presented for Nanaimo’s waterfront walkway
On the other hand I can see it from the politicians’ point of view of gold, silver and bronze medals – those being the convention centre, the cruise ship dock, and now the waterfront walkway.
Maybe the stain of this embarrassment could be erased by investing only a small portion of those wasted funds in the effort to save the Nanaimo Recycling Exchange, a facility that actually does some material good to the community, the district and the Island. What a gold medal that would be!
The sad part of it all is that the potential demise of this very essential service has now become a non issue in the news industry; no investigating, no digging for facts, no follow up. As dead as yesterday’s news, as the saying goes.
Rod Hancock, Nanaimo
To the editor,
I would like to add my thanks to the many others who attempt to keep the beach at Departure Bay as clean as possible.
Right now we need help to remove the excessive number of cigarette butts, especially below the walkway wall. The coming winter high tides will wash them into the Bay, where they are hazardous to wildlife, especially fish.
It is unfortunate that since the improvements to the walkway and lighting, that there has been a marked increase in litter and indiscriminate dumping of garbage.
Action is needed now to clean this once pristine beach and to keep it that way.
Any extension to the walkway must factor in beach maintenance.
Daphne Paterson, Nanaimo