Vancouver has always been a small city with a backwater mentality, when compared to many other cities. Vancouver is smaller in area & population than 7 other cities in Canada.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_the_largest_municipalities_in_Canada_by_population
However, the Greater Vancouver Region is still the 3 largest metropolitan_area_in_Canada. Yet, it remains a mystery as to where all the big city scale infrastructure went, because what's mostly built in Greater Vancouver is half-sized or half-assed stuff. Indeed, a watered-down approach to things has been the name of the game for generations. Thus, after several decades of not properly building for the future, SW BC is still very congested and backwards.
There is nothing wrong with being small or thinking small. However, Vancouver and Victoria have perpetuated a small-scale mentality for several decades. Of course Vancouver would opt to have shorter underground train stations than Montreal, Toronto, Edmonton & Seattle. A short BC train just can't transport as many people as an 8-10 car train can. Just because the Skytrain is an automated system, the 50m to 80m trains just can't match a 152.5m Montreal Metro trains capacity.
The bridges are narrow, but not just to prevent induced demand. It's almost impossible for backwards Greater Vancouver to have an efficient rapid-bus or proper truck-lanes, when many of the bridges are only 2 lanes each way. Whether its a multigenerational, backwards power-structure, or its just part of the backwater BC mentality, there should be a point of realization.
Why pretend to have an efficient rapid-bus network, when there is a refusal to build a series of proper regional bus & truck bridges? In order for busses to be fast & efficient, there has to be dedicated bus-lanes on new bridges. An efficient regional port using a lot of trucks to the airport & seaports, also requires dedicated truck-lanes in order to efficiently move things around.
https://dailyhive.com/vancouver/global-bc-anchor-behind-the-scenes
