That Council defer further discussion for pedestrian safety upgrades near Bayview School to the upcoming meeting scheduled to review pedestrian unallocated funding and have Staff provide options for consideration for pedestrian safety improvements near Bayview School at that time.
Procedural vote
goes back to something Ms. McNaughton said in her presentation around the school board. We received one letter today from a school trustee and I understand the principal has issued a letter but to my knowledge Mr. Sims and correct me if I'm wrong there has been no formal request from the school board itself whether by way of vote or memorandum from their superintendent asking us to make this particular school and safety in the area priority over others. Is that a fair comment? That's correct, Your Worship. Then I think there's no question that Councillor Thorpe's motion is the appropriate one. I appreciate the advocacy of everyone who's come here tonight, but I think that is the
I'm just wondering if, like a motion to defer, it doesn't include for me the piece that I would be hoping staff could bring to that discussion around options for safer pedestrian infrastructure it as part of it. I don't want to come into that conversation at the same point we're at now with no clear sense of what our options are. Because it is clear that sidewalks aren't an option because I think you mentioned that there is not storm drains in that area which are needed infrastructure piece to have sidewalks. Okay, challenging and expensive is literally everything we do. So I, yeah, I appreciate that but it's, yeah. Okay, so for me, like I'm not in favor of an option to defer because prefer that we put into words the things that we're looking for staff to bring to that meeting. So for me, I would be looking for the options to support safe pedestrian initiatives in and around the Bayview School neighbourhood.
Thank you. I will be supporting the motion because I know staff is going to be bringing those options forward. I know one that Mr. Simms spoke about for those that weren't at the public safety meeting possibly putting bollards in which would make it safer or the big cement curbing. So I think our staff is good enough to know that they will look at different options for us and bring them forward as to what can be done and what the cost will be. And I would be interested in knowing what the cost would be to put in proper sidewalks as well. I know it's going to be expensive, but at the end of the day it's still this Council's decision to make where dollars are spent. Thank you.
First of all, I appreciate all the delegations on this this evening, and especially the work of Ms. Robertson and the South End Community Association, who are always very reasoned and do their homework. And certainly pedestrian safety, especially in school zones, is naturally important to me, as it is to all of Council. But I am a little bit leery, Your Worship, this evening, of setting some kind of precedent where we're responding to one neighbourhood only with their concerns when we know very well that there are other neighbourhoods that also have similar concerns about pedestrian safety in their locations. We hear regularly from the north end. So it's very hard to weigh the needs of one area against the other and I don't think it would be fair to immediately respond to a request from one area without putting everything in perspective with information from staff. So my personal feeling on this is that we need to discuss this further. We need to get more information. Councillor Manley has made suggestions of several possible innovative ideas. I would prefer, Your Worship, that we defer further discussion on this topic until we from staff some more information on, first of all, details about our unallocated pedestrian safety funding and possible, as I said, innovative ideas that might help solve this problem and others. I'm prepared to make that a motion if it's required, but I'll turn to you for that. So I will make that motion then to defer further discussion on this until we can receive staff information regarding our unallocated pedestrian funding and potential traffic or safety improvement innovations.
Thanks Your Worship. Yes, I was just going to assure that House of Leeds Mayor that that was the intent and that I did have some type of wording in there asking for a look at options and I think I referenced innovative type solutions that might be part of part of the answer to this problem so it was to do with those possible solutions it was to do with the unallocated pedestrian safety funding and also just a general sense of where the city's at with our triage of priorities across the city thank you thank you very much