On June 15, Community First team member Dee Beattie suggests residents in Sapperton and neighbourhoods with railway crossings to consider upgrading their own windows, and keeping them closed, as a solution to the incessant annoyance and degradation in quality of living caused by 24/7 train whistle noise.
![\"\"](\"https://nwprogressives.ca/wp-content/uploads/2022/03/Rick-small-headshot-150x150.jpg\")
Ms. Beattie commented on the train whistle cessation issue within the Facebook group New Westminster City Watch – “Changing our aluminum single pane windows to vinyl doubles with extra noise barriers was huge for us. I can’t hear the pile driving either at 100 Braid and I am really close to that.”
“Dee Beattie should apologize to the residents of Sapperton and others in New Westminster living within range of the disruptive train whistles,” says council candidate Rick Folka. “To openly suggest that residents should cope by paying for upgrades to their windows and keeping them closed in potential heat dome conditions is simply being tone deaf to residents’ concerns.
“Changing our aluminum single pane windows to vinyl doubles with extra noise barriers was huge for us. I can’t hear the pile driving either at 100 Braid and I am really close to that.” Dee Beattie – Community First candidate
As a lifelong New Westminster resident, I’m deeply disappointed at the pace this file has moved in the past four years. Sapperton residents were promised before the last election there would be real progress made on this file, but the current council has clearly not made this a priority.”
In 2018, NWP attended a meeting organized by a group of concerned Sapperton residents on this issue, a meeting also attended by Community First’s Patrick Johnstone. Mr. Johnstone promised action for these residents then, but the status quo remains. When elected, the New West Progressives (NWP) are committed to engaging with Transport Canada and the four railway companies who operate these crossings to make meaningful progress to whistle cessation in New Westminster. The aim will be to stop the whistles as quickly as possible – doing everything possible to achieve this commitment by the end of the next term of council. The NWP also plans to assign a city councillor to manage the intergovernmental relations related to this issue and help to expedite approvals. The councillor will be asked to track and regularly keep council and the public updated on the progress being made to eliminate train whistles in both Sapperton and Queensborough.
“These are the types of basic issues the current council has lost sight of when it comes to addressing key neighbourhood priorities,” says Folka. “Our team is going to make sure the residents of Sapperton and Queensborough are treated in the same way as their neighbours in Quayside, who thankfully, no longer have to deal with train whistle noise.”