As a British Columbian, If I were to take an informal poll on The Kinder Morgan Pipeline expansion, I think these results would be pretty accurate:
30 percent want it.
30 percent don’t care or are undecided.
30 percent don’t want it.
One exception to this poll, is that In general, the City of Surrey wants it.
The Surrey board of Trade has come out in favor of it. Here’s the link:
https://businessinsurrey.com/2018/02/surrey-board-of-trade-says-pipeline-politics-needs-to-stop/
Why?
Surrey has the most to benefit from the pipeline and the least to lose. It is the fastest growing city in BC with 1,000 new residents arriving each month.
Surrey people don’t enjoy a view of Burrard Inlet from their home. They couldn’t see an oil spill with a telescope from there.
Surrey people have to drive for 40 minutes to get to the seawall in Stanley Park.
But first, they need to fill up on gas to drive 40 minutes to the sea wall. After leaving their house that is heated by gas. Almost every adult in Surrey needs a car because the transit in the city has not kept pace with the exploding population and is inadequate.
The youth in Surrey and their parents do a lot of driving. The pipeline supplies Canadian gas. They rely on gas for their transportation.
Premier Horgan removed the bridge tolls on the Port Mann Bridge, which enables Surrey residents to get in and out of Vancouver cheaply. The young population in Surrey makes up a large portion of the labour force for Vancouver.
Surrey has the largest youth population in the country. Those youth need the 15,000 jobs that the pipeline will provide. This provides an income for Surrey youth, some of which are involved with gangs and crime and drugs.
SURREY’S THE DIRTY ONE THAT WANTS TO MAKE THE PIPELINE HAPPEN.
Surrey is largely a blue collar city and is on pace to become the largest city in BC in the coming decades.
The youth of Surrey often still live with their parents (because they can’t afford to buy a single family house even in Surrey, where a townhome is $500,000.00). That’s why they want the 15,000 jobs from the twinning of the pipeline.
If the Greens and NDP approved the twinning of the pipeline and concentrated all their efforts on preventing an oil spill, everybody wins. British Columbia has increased trade in Canadian oil, Alberta’s economy is revived, Surrey’s youth are employed, and Vancouver gets the tourism spinoff business and the politicians are stewards of the environment.