Platform
Issues that matter to me
Six specific things. Each one is live at the council table right now, and each one comes down to a vote in the next term. Here is where I stand and what I will do.
Roads & neighbourhoods
Stop the Third Street throughway
The proposal links Mountain Road directly through to Pretty River Parkway. What that actually does is turn a residential street into a bypass.
Every town eventually faces the same offer: shave a few minutes off a cross-town trip by pushing that traffic by somebody’s front yard. It always looks efficient on a traffic model and it always looks different from the sidewalk. Once a residential street becomes a through route, the volume never goes back down. The speed never goes back down. The children on that street inherit the decision.
My commitment
On council, I will oppose the Third Street throughway, every time it comes forward. Our neighbourhoods must take preference over traffic.
Infrastructure
Fix the chronic flooding on Cranberry Trail West
Cranberry Trail West at Highway 26 floods every spring. Not once in a generation, annually and predictably. Ask the nearby residents, they know
The fix crosses jurisdictions, the town, the province at the highway, and the Nottawasaga Valley Conservation Authority and the condo corps to come up with solutions that minimize the threat and deal with the issue. Somebody has to keep all three in the same conversation until an engineered solution is funded and built. Keeping people in the same conversation is what a mediator does for a living.
My commitment
Push for an engineered, funded and scheduled fix at Cranberry Trail West and Highway 26 — and keep reporting publicly on where it stands until the water stops coming up.
“Christopher has worked with our neighbourhood on flooding issues and has provided support and guidance with the Town and NVCA with this complex issue.”
Heather McCleary
Woodland Court, Cranberry Marsh
Field research
One of the Duckmaster’s ducks, checking the water.
Water & environment
Water quantity and the Stormwater Master Plan
Collingwood has a Stormwater Master Plan. What it needs now is implementation, with some tweaks.
A master plan is only worth the capital budget behind it. The plan sets out how this town handles the water that falls on it: where it goes, what slows it down, which infrastructure is already past its design storm. Implementation is the unglamorous part with ponds, culverts, storage, maintenance schedules, and development conditions that actually get enforced.
My commitment
Implement the Stormwater Master Plan on a funded schedule, and revisit the assumptions on water quantity so the plan matches the Collingwood we actually have.
Collingwood water tower
Christopher, out on the campaign trail.
Safe streets
Implement Vision Zero
Design our neighbourhoods for people, not cars. No one should die or be seriously injured on a Collingwood street simply for walking, cycling or crossing it.
Vision Zero is not a slogan about hating cars. It is a design standard. It says that human beings make mistakes, that streets should be built so those mistakes are not fatal, and that when a collision happens we ask what about the road allowed it — not just who to blame. In practice that means narrower lanes where speed is the problem, real crossings where people actually cross, protected space for cyclists, and sightlines at intersections that work for an eight-year-old and an eighty-year-old alike.
I sit on the On The Move committee at Cameron Street Public School. There is no better argument for this than watching kids negotiate a crossing that was designed around traffic flow.
My commitment
Adopt Vision Zero as Collingwood’s road safety standard, with a costed action plan, annual public reporting, and traffic calming prioritised where residents and school communities say the risk actually is.
Democracy & representation
A ward system for Collingwood
Right now every councillor is elected at large. That means every councillor represents everyone, which in practice can mean no one in particular answers for your street.
A ward system gives each part of town a councillor with a name, a boundary and a reason to know that neighbourhood in detail. It lowers the cost of running, so people who are not already well known town-wide can put their name forward. And it makes accountability concrete: at the next election, the people most affected by a decision are the people deciding whether you keep the seat.
Collingwood has grown enough that the at-large model is straining. Getting to wards means a proper public process, an independent boundary review, real consultation, and a decision made in the open rather than settled quietly by whoever is comfortable with the current arrangement.
My commitment
Bring forward a ward boundary review with genuine public consultation, so Collingwood can move to at least consider the merits of a ward system so every neighbourhood has representatiion.
Money & accountability
Fiscal prudence
I am optimistic about Collingwood’s future in the near and far term but I also must be prudent regarding our future budgetary decisions.
Fiscal prudence is not the same thing as refusing to spend. A town that will not repair a culvert pays for the road later. A town that defers its asset management plan is not saving money, it is moving the bill to the next council and adding interest. Prudence means knowing what we own, what condition it is in, what it will cost to keep, and saying so out loud before the budget vote rather than after.
My commitment
To manage our coming expenditures prudently and only agree to sound investments that pay dividends to the future of our Town.
Missing something?
Tell me what matters on your street
Six priorities is a platform, not the whole town. If the thing keeping you up at night is not on this page, I would genuinely like to hear it.