Re: Transit task force a $200,000 waste, May 27.

It is interesting to note that it took three years for Coun. Russ Wyatt to acknowledge that the Rapid Transit Taskforce formed in late 2004, which was to consult the public, seek expert advice, and complete a final report in 2005, was a complete waste of money.

The fact is that the Rapid Transit Task Force was a sop given to Wyatt by Mayor Sam Katz because Katz had cancelled former mayor Glen Murray's bus rapid transit plan. The original recommendations of the task force were not to be found in the final report. That is, that the majority of those citizens involved in the consultation favoured some kind of rapid transit, either BRT or light rail transit (an LRT in the downtown area) and significant money for transit upgrades. Ultimately, the task force called for a significant increase in diamond lanes for buses which, as Wyatt has indicated, Transit feels will create more traffic problems than they will alleviate, and the creation of busways parallel to Pembina and Nairn has been completely ignored.

As Jeff Lowe, urban planner has indicated, the rapid transit debate has been framed as if the only realistic choice available to Winnipeg's decision-makers was to build a short, entirely insufficient so-called BRT or setting aside bus-only diamond curb lanes on major thoroughfares.

Ultimately, with the rising cost of gas, Wyatt's reason for wanting some kind of rapid transit system in Winnipeg is to get more people out of their cars and on to transit. The reality is that BRT technology has proven costly, inflexible, and anything but rapid. All major cities have real LRT systems. Study after study proves that BRT attracts fewer riders and even fewer new riders than LRT.