Dharm Makwana

To be clear, I'm no political insider.

I haven't documented Vancouver's growing pains for years like journalist Frances Bula. I haven't glided seamlessly from federal to municipal politics like veteran communications expert Michael Klassen. And, I haven't pulled strings and pushed buttons at City Hall like Non Partisan Association puppetmaster-turned-commentator A. G. Tsakumis.

But sometimes you don't need an impressive resume like the trio of heavyweights listed above to read between the lines.

This morning Prime Minister Stephen Harper and B.C. Premier Gordon Campbell celebrated the conclusion of the 2010 Games by announcing millions in infrastructure spending across the province on 15 old fashioned shovel-ready road building projects. The most notable in the bunch is $13 million to build a rapid bus lane in the City of Surrey.

Surrey.

When pressed by the media as to why more money or more projects weren't devoted to expanding transit service Mr. Harper spoke for himself and impressively kept Premier Campbell in line when doing so.

Said Mr. Harper: “As the provincial government would agree the federal government’s contribution to transit projects here in British Columbia -- in fact in major cities across the country -- has been very, very large and very generous in the last few years. As I say, all governments will be operating in more constrained fiscal environments in the future but we always sit down with our partners at the municipal and provincial levels to discuss what their highest priorities are.”

Connecting Vancouver to the international airport by way of rapid transit and to Whistler village with the Sea To Sky Highway, apparently, satisfied the feds appetite to fulfill the Olympic city's priorities. The Olympics are over, you know.

At a separate press conference, however, held two hours later and in a different part of town, Mayor Gregor Robertson, known for riding his bike daily and successfully avoiding helmet hair, lobbied for a sustainable transit legacy to supply demand created by a record number of riders during the Olympics.

Mr. Robertson, on his third go around answering a question on the potential for an Olympic transit legacy clearly articulated the city's needs and demands.

“We do need to provide a lot more service there’s no question about that," a reporter finally coaxed out of Mr. Robertson. "Particularly out to the west, our priority is the Broadway corridor out to UBC and that has to come in behind the Evergreen Line, which the region needs as a top priority. But we need to see more transit capacity in Vancouver. I have no doubt people will ride more transit if the service is better"

That sounds pretty fair, right?

So perhaps, it was poor political optics that kept the right wing prime minister and the right leaning premier apart from the more liberal Robertson in their common goal of celebrating the Games. After all, the mayor could possibly be gun shy when it comes to cross-party photo-ops after being burned for heaping praise on the premier when introducing him before a speech. There's even a wikipedia entry on the snafu.
 
Mr. Harper, on the other hand, seems to only stop for pictures when he's surrounded by supporters three rows deep. Plus an image of the two pols together would be at every editor's fingertips when deciding how to illustrate the growing federal-municipal divide on Vanouver's supervised drug injection site.

But, the more likely and logical answer is that dollars and cents have caused a deep rift leaving Mr. Harper and Mr. Campbell to read from an entirely different script than Mr. Robertson.

What became obvious to me after 45 minutes of politicians blowing hot air, for Vancouver the cupboard is bare. (Apologies for bastardizing a phrase from the Gordon Campbell's hymn book with the flare of Rev. Al Sharpton.)

Vancouver had federal help in hosting the big party. So it's the city's turn move to the very back of the line and go hungry while waiting for federal stimulus, now and in the forseeable future, while Surrey, Richmond and other Conservative ridings have limited dollars doled out in their direction.

Remember, the feds are on the hook for a $900 million Olympic security budget along with their share of the tab for the Canada Line and Sea To Sky Highway -- all Vancouver-centric projects.

For Mr. Robertson, the situation, set in a constrained fiscal environment as Harper described it, leaves him as a lame duck for at least the remainder of his present term.

Mr. Harper didn't blink when dismissing the idea of paying a pittance of $6 million to keep streetcars running on the Olympic Line. From my vantage point, he may have even smirked a little when extinguishing that particular hope.

Just imagine how quickly Mr. Harper would step all over Mr. Robertson's desire for a multi-billion dollar national housing strategy -- a key plank for the mayor now and likely during the next municipal election.

Or, another billion-dollar commitment to extend rapid transit to UBC. As a reminder, this mayor is against cut-and-cover construction for rapid transit and taxpayers love their view of the mountains, which leaves boring a tunnel as the only viable and expensive option. Unless, of course, Vancouver gets money to expand street level rapid transit like the Olympic Line. Oh wait, Mr. Harper already said, no, to that.

To be clear, the feds won't spend another dime on Vancouver until election season rolls around. And when that happens dollar commitments will parallel the cost of downtown condo at best.

When Mr. Robertson does get around to tinkering with the city's arteries after the Paralympics close he will have to instruct city staff to do it on the cheap. Closing the Georgia and/or Dunsmuir Viaducts to auto traffic is free. Zoning a pedestrian plaza down is free. Shoot, even holding car free days are kind of free.

Should the penny-pinching process be successful an artificial demand for public transit would be created and could spur on that transit legacy everyone seems to say Vancouver so desperately wants.

For now smoke and mirrors instead of expanded service is the best and only trick this mayor can pull.