Directors shuffled on TransLink board

TransLink has announced some upcoming changes to who sits on its board of directors.

Two new directors have appointed, says the regional transit authority in a news released issued today (November 16).

They are Barry Forbes, president and CEO of Westminster Savings and Credit Union and former chair of the Fraser Health Authority, and Don Rose, who has held senior governance roles at Placer Dome and Columbia Power Corporation.

Forbes and Rose replace outgoing board chair Dale Parker and director David Unruh who have decided to not seek reappointment.

As well, Nancy Olewiler, a professor in the Simon Fraser University economics department, has been reappointed to serve a second term on the board.

The returning director and new directors were appointed by the Mayors’ Council on Regional Transportation to each serve three-year terms starting on January 1, 2011.

According to TransLink, the board of directors oversees the regional transportation authority’s finances, major capital projects, operations, and strategic planning.

Comments

10 Comments

Evil Eye

Nov 16, 2010 at 3:25pm

Merely changing the deck chairs on the Titanic. The newly appointed Board of Amateurs will do nothing but collect a healthy stipend.

transLink board nothnig more than glorified monkeys

Nov 16, 2010 at 3:33pm

People with business or economics degrees have low level rudimentary degrees and are only suited to count the beans in some back room; they do not deserve to be making $300K/year. If you want to make beans, you better have people who understand transit operations. If Apple or Microsoft were being led by monkeys with rudimentary business and economics degrees where would Microsoft and Apple be? TransLink is a hopeless cause run by glorified patronage appointed monkeys. It can only lose so many billions of dollars building $2 billion SkyTrain transit to move 30,000 transit users before it is gone.

Michael Castanaveras

Nov 16, 2010 at 5:14pm

Stephen Thomson, I would be very interested to know which of these new board members commutes by transit on a daily basis. Perhaps a few phone calls could make for an interesting follow-up to this article.

RonS

Nov 17, 2010 at 7:16am

Early in Skytrains planning stage there were worries that a street level rail transportation system would impede traffic at road/rail crossing points. Also the government of the day, Bill Bennett and the SoCreds were in trouble with the unions because of their gutting of labour legislation in favour of Big Business (sound familiar?) and wanted a system that has fewer employees. So they opted for the more expensive elevated system.

I and another fellow (an electrical engineer who's name I have forgotten) sumitted a paper demonstrating how much more inefficient the electrical system used to move the elevated trains was to street level systems and for the cost of a elevated system you could build a light rail street level system all over the lower mainland from New West to Richmond to Vancouver for the same cost.

Well the government wanted the "New Elevated" system as a monument to themselves and of course they didn't want to deal with labour that would be required to run the street level system.

The system we have now is bleeding us dry and we have a bunch of Translink directors that can't see the forest for the trees.

politics101

Nov 17, 2010 at 8:33am

Michael - since when is Translink a bus company only - they are a regional transportation authority responsible for ALL methods of travel within Metro Vancouver including buses, roads, bikes, at one time ferries, snow removal on many major routes, bridges - ie Golden Ears so your comment is a little off based.

@politics101

Nov 17, 2010 at 12:18pm

Don't we have a conflict of interest in TransLink managing transit and road construction? Personally, I think that each city in Metro-Vancouver would have better transit if it looked after its transit requirements.

I know that Vancouver is unhappy about the use of diesel buses on former and current trolley bus routes on Cambie Street and out to UBC but bows to TransLink to avoid a confrontation. An umbrella organization like TransLink can't possibly please all cities here and polarizes the cities against each other.

truthbetold

Nov 17, 2010 at 1:47pm

No wonder TransDink is in trouble - they keep getting people with NO experience in transportation on their board. Just doesn't make sense! Can we please instill some professionalism within TransDink! Maybe when the NDP get into government they will replace the accounts and lawyers with people who know about the latest and most innovative transportation systems now being offered everywhere EXCEPT in B.C.

Evil Eye

Nov 17, 2010 at 7:14pm

@ RonS

In the real world, SkyTrain has more employees than light rail systems of the same size. Also, elevated transit systems are poor in attracting new ridership.

Notice no one else in North america or Europe builds with SkyTrain?

RonS

Nov 19, 2010 at 7:24am

Evil Eye why not look at the system employed in Portland Oregan, Calgary and the TTC streetcar system in Toronto. Toronto, I heard a while ago, may be expanding the streetcar system. We already have the tracks for a streetcar system already in some parts of Greater Vancouver. Rail is just under the pavement. It just needs to be rebuilt and improved to become operational again.