A new anti-idling bylaw is in the works for the City of Delta.
During council’s discussion on April 11, about a recent letter from a resident, frustrated about idling cars at schools and wondering when Delta will come up with a bylaw, city manager Sean McGill assured it’s on the radar.
He noted staff had a number of green initiatives and bylaws to get completed first including the plastic bag ban bylaw, tree bylaw and Delta’s electric vehicle strategy.
McGill noted an anti-idling bylaw would be coming up next and a report will be presented to council by the end of June.
The Climate and Community Livability Advisory Committee last year endorsed a proposed bylaw.
Council two years ago agreed to have staff look into an anti-idling bylaw, which would be part of a comprehensive series of climate action change recommendations.
At the time, Mike Brotherston, Delta’s manager of climate action and environment, said such a bylaw has worked elsewhere.
His report to council noted that while Delta has implemented an anti-idling policy for its own fleet, a broader bylaw that addressed idling in the community hasn’t been done.
During council’s consideration of the application for a new drive-thru Tim Hortons in East Ladner a few years ago, concerns were expressed about idling cars.
A staff memo on the application noted Tim Horton's parent company, TDL Group Corp., commissioned a study of the air quality impacts of vehicles using their drive-thru facilities.
For the five locations examined, the study concluded that a typical restaurant without a drive-thru creates more emissions due to vehicles starting up and travelling within the parking lot, and a typical site layout for a drive-thru facility produces no adverse air effects to adjacent land uses.
