Burnaby plans for universal water metering
Universal water metering strategy. City of Burnaby council report, December 2, 2024.
Right now, Burnaby charges a flat rate (“all you can eat”) for residential drinking water - about $650 per year, regardless of how much water you actually use. Councillor Joe Keithley (Green), quoted in a Langara Voice article by Jamie Mah:
“If you have a giant house, a swimming pool, and you’re washing three cars, and you’re watering a huge garden, you pay the same amount of money for your water that the senior citizen that lives in a small apartment does. Is that fair?” said Keithley.
Usage-based charges mean that households have a direct incentive to use less water, since it saves them money. Vanessa Anthony, with MVRD, says that a typical household uses 15-30% less water with water metering and usage-based charges. In particular, watering lawns uses a lot of water - water usage goes up about 50% in the summer.
Burnaby’s plan to install water meters is as follows:
As of July 2024, all new homes are required to have water meters.
The city will install water meters for about 5,500 homes with water service connections that can fit a meter, at $1000 each. (“City estimates are likely on the high side.”)
The city will install water meters for about 7,400 homes with rented secondary suites, at $2500 each.
The cost of the water meters will be paid by the city. The flat-rate billing system will continue until January 2027.
More
Previously: Water metering.
New Burnaby water metering strategy may see rising costs to residents. Jamie Mah, Langara Voice, April 2024. One correction: the story says that Denmark residents pay $7 per litre. I’m pretty sure it was supposed to say $7 per cubic metre (1000 litres).
Burnaby approves multimillion-dollar plan for water meters in homes, pay-for-use coming 2027. Lauren Vanderdeen, Burnaby Now, December 2024.
Good lord, there are still cities just getting to universal? I was with Calgary Waterworks through our long period of getting people to switch. What a long game that was - decades.
Russil, misusing this for a question right to you. My anti-military-spending crank-issue got me into a very cranky post at fellow Canuck Dan Gardner this morn:
https://substack.com/profile/1998437-roy-brander/note/c-82252410
...and it crosses my mind to take that $40B "ask" for the military even further, as a housing comparison. I was about right to round out a "house" (well, decent dwelling, if not SFD) at $500K? I think that was the rough number for those boilerplate 6-unit plans you brought up a few weeks ago? And wouldn't they be cheaper if we built 80,000 of them a year?
Further, what would the uptake be if we built 160,000 and sold them for $250K each? Could we say "We could simply end the whole housing crisis for well under $40B a year" ?
I was actually thinking of about $10B - $2B on "remediating brownfields into developable land" and $8B on 32,000 of those half-million-dollar dwellings, sold at half price.
And, while I'm thinking big, has anybody suggested building cheap housing for people who cannot work - the mentally and physically disabled, old people wanting to age at home - in all those emptying-out small towns? Then they'd have jobs providing care services...
I know your blog is local, doesn't normally talk in tens of billions of direct government spending, because it's considered politically hopeless, but the military guys always get me going...