On Sept. 6 at the first council meeting of this month, various topics were discussed. First topic of interest was the proposed bus stop route within Houston.
There will be approximately seven bus stops within Houston, one of which will be sheltered.
The transit route proceeds from the east of Houston coming from Burns Lake and travels south on Butler Avenue where a stop is located to pick up residents in the area by Silverthorne elementary school as well as residents living on the other side, near the senior housing. The bus will continue onto fourteenth street driving in front of the arena, pool, and the senior home on Copeland Avenue. The route will travel to the residence areas living up Mountainview Drive. The sheltered bus stop is proposed to be located on Hagman Crescent. The route continues through the area to the end of Olsson Road and Goold Road. Then travels back onto Hwy. 16 to Smithers.
The transit route from the east proceeds south on Butler Avenue, west on 14th Street in front of the arena and pool, north on Copeland Avenue, west on Hwy 16, south on Tweeie Avenue, south on Mountainview Drive, west onto Hagman Crescent, west on Pearson Rd, south on Sullivan Way, west on Olsson Road, west on Goold Road, north on Hillside Drive, north on Kanata Ave, west on Hwy 16 to Smithers.
Alternative suggestions are being made for some of the proposed located bus stops. High traffic residence areas in Houston are being considered, as well as what areas are best equip for the bus to safely pull in and out.
“[Residents] will be able to flag down the bus as it is approaching,” commented Michael Glavin, Chief Administrative Officer at the District of Houston.
A second topic of interest that evening was the $10,000 the District of Houston received from the B.C. Rural Dividend Program to conduct an airport feasibility study. This study will determine what upgrades are necessary for the airport and if the airport is eligible for air ambulance and light industrial delivery services.
“Initially we were looking at funding for a certain project,” commented Councillor Tim Anderson.
“There are three funding streams. One was $10,000 for the study, up to $100,000 for for the project or partnership. At this time we established that we don’t have a project that would could comfortable say would meet the criteria for that funding, so we decided to get that criteria set up,” replied Glavin.
Amendments to Bylaw No. 1040 was another topic reviewed by the council at the meeting. These amendments included improvement of wording and interpretation in several of the clauses, reduction of floodplain exemption standards in non-Agricultural Land Reserve areas, allowances for signs for existing developments, and the prohibition of shipping containers as an accessory building in the C1 zone.
“We went through the whole agreement, not just the big changes, we don’t want to have to do this again, so we changed everything that was possible [and needed amending],” commented Glavin.
And finally Gerald Pinchbeck was appointment chief election officer that evening at last week’s council meeting. His responsibility will be to conduct a local by-election to fill the one vacant council seat since Dawn Potvin’s resignation.
“An ad has been placed in the paper [for the position] but no responses have been received yet,” commented Glavin.