This week we had our last 379B class meeting for this academic term. In exactly one month we will be heading to Williams Lake to conduct our research. We recognize the host of preparations that still need to be done in April before our virtual conference. We have drafted out the things that need to be done before we arrive Williams Lake in order to maximize the limited time we will spend there.

After several discussions with the team, talking to urban researchers from our mini day panel and interviewing a postgraduate student from UBC School of Community and Regional Planning, we critically thought through our methodologies and chose the major ones that we will be using. Continue reading →

During the third week of February, our group member Stella made a trip up to the City of Williams Lake. During her three day stay, she was able to meet with our community partners (Jessica & Matt) and conduct informal interviews with them. During her stay Matt kindly offered to drive her around the city outskirts and gave a tour in the downtown area. In addition to this, Stella also had the chance to walk around the city and observe some of the aspects of local daily activities.

After coming back from Williams Lake Stella shared her experience with the whole team. We quickly realized that the situation is more complex than we initially thought. As such the ideas that we brainstormed early on may not be applicable due to the topographic barriers, demographics composition and the lack of infrastructural development in the city. In addition to this it became clear that transportation issues cannot be explored in isolation. There are many existing social and ethical problems intertwined with one another that affect the transportation issue. We recognize that we may have been too ambitious about the goal of our project, and we are now trying to redirect our focus. Continue reading →

During the past two weeks, we have mainly been focusing on developing a research question for our project with the Social Planning Council. Our community partner has kindly supported us with meeting notes from the Williams Lake Transit Service Key Stakeholders Workshop. It came to a conclusion that some main issues with current local transit are:

1. People not feeling safe where certain bus stops are currently located
2. The bus service ends too early. People that work later shifts where are unable to take the bus home after work. Also students that attend night classes at the local University are unable to take the bus after night classes end.
3. No service on Sundays.
4. Bus passes are not easily accessible. Only one location to access bus passes.
5. No service to surrounding areas outside city limits. Limits the ability for people to get into town.
6. Bus service frequency is limited to once an hour.

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The 4 of us in this team ( Ilaine, Maegan, Stephanie, Stella) are all truly excited to be able to work alongside with the Social Planning Council of Williams Lake.

When we contacted our community partner, Jessica, she said that the board would not be meeting until the second last week of January. In addition to this, the membership is only meeting the last week of January. As such she suggested that we touch base on January 28th or 29th so that she can give us as much insight as possible.

As a result, the only information we have in regards to possibilities for research question is surrounding the concern for transportation and access to schools for communities that live outside of central Williams Lake. We therefore decided to use our time right now to do some preliminary research to understand the context in which our question may sit, brainstormed some potential research questions, discussed methodologies, identified possible obstacles/challenges, envision desired outcomes, and discuss what we hope to gain in our own personal development. Nothing is set in stone yet as we realize that due to the nature of this project we may need to adapt as we collaborate with our community partner and face unforeseen challenges. Continue reading →