Koryo: A place to eat Korean food

The following April 18th story on a local Korean restaurant was in the Burnaby Now.

Koryo Korean Barbecue a Brentwood treat

Photographer Larry Wright and I had a great time a recent Sunday at Koryo Korean Barbecue. Our host Yoon was a perfect host and Emily Shen in the Koryo corporate office did a great job arranging the outing. And thanks to Jolanda Peters at Brentwood for suggesting this little jewel.

You’ll read an abridged version of this in the April 18 Burnaby NOW, but here’s the full length version, with all the pics.

By Alfie Lau

No less an authority than Jolanda Peters, Brentwood Town Centre’s marketing director, led us to Koryo Korean Barbecue.

Peters couldn’t stop raving about how fresh and tasty the food was at the Korean fusion restaurant located in the mall’s food court. She’s a regular diner there and said it was one of her favourite places, bar none.

When we visited and sat down with franchisee Dong Yoon Lee – everybody calls him Yoon – we were impressed with
the food and the friendly staff at Koryo.

Yoon immigrated to Canada in 2007 and while he holds an engineering and materials science degree, his credentials didn’t transfer over and he started looking for alternative employment.

He came across Koryo, at both the Park Royal and Brentwood locations and in January 2010, he decided to take the plunge and invest in the only Burnaby location.

Along with his staff of five, Yoon has built a loyal following by offering good-sized portions at affordable prices and in a quick manner...

To continue reading full article click the link to the Burnaby Now article  

Brentwood Station Faregate Installation

Parts of Brentwood Station have been walled up to prepare for the faregate installation scheduled for completion next year.  Some of the details are in the sign below.

New sidewalks and streetlights for Lougheed Hwy

Another step towards improving walkability in the area is being taken as the City of Burnaby will be paving new sidewalks on both sides of Lougheed Hwy from Douglas Rd to east of Holdom Ave.  The project will also see the installation of streetlights between Douglas Rd and Sperling Ave.  The total cost of the project will be $900, 000 to be shared 50/50 with TransLink.  Sidewalks have been sorely needed along that stretch of Lougheed since the 90s as people (myself included) trying to get to the bus stops along that stretch have had to walk on the shoulder along Lougheed Hwy with cars whizzing by.

TransLink officials should be fired

Here are 3 of the many reasons that TransLink officials should be fired from the "jobs they do".

1. Due to its inability to manage finances in a market where it has no competition, TransLink must make up for a $30 million shortfall by leaving 2 busy SkyTrain stations without turnstiles, one of them Metrotown Station which is the busiest in Burnaby.
2. The turnstiles will not ensure that all riders will be paying for their ride because the turnstile gates are the paddle type which can be circumvented by people athletic enough to go over and under them.  Great.  Our TransLink decision-makers opted for a flawed system of fare collection to overcome its original decision to have a flawed honour system of fare collection when there have been fare gates that prevent circumvention for decades in places that probably weren't consulted.  I wonder how much they got paid to make such a bad decision?
3. I just heard that Brentwood Station will have 3 new turnstiles built into one of the fastest growing areas of not only Burnaby, but Metro Vancouver.  It has been long known that Brentwood is projected to be a major residential/commercial and transportation hub in Metro Vancouver and TransLink is putting in only 3 turnstiles into a station that will sit next to an expanded Brentwood Mall accompanied by at least 10 new residential high-rise towers within 100 metres in the next 5 years in addition to the existing high-rises in the area.

TransLink Officials receive lucrative salaries to make decisions that reflect complete incompetence.  They must be fired for their inability to run a business in which they have no competition.

Milestones makes way for Solo District

I noticed yesterday from the SkyTrain yesterday that the Milestones Restaurant on the northwest corner of the Solo District property has closed down to make room for the massive development there.  Time will tell if and where a new Milestones will open up in the area.  Milestones has left the following message online:

Burnaby Milestones has closed its doors as of March 31st. Thank you Burnaby community for a fantastic 20 years! Stay tuned for exciting information about a new location coming soon!

City engineer vs local resident on street "improvements"

I found the following video clip on the blog, Price Tags (My Favourites list on the right).  The video was created by Strong Towns (strongtowns.org), an organization in the United States that challenges the "conventional" model of city planning and growth.

The video highlights the potential disconnect somewhere between "old school" engineers and the local residents that municipal governments preside over.  I cannot verify this with documented proof, but from speaking to longtime local residents of my neighbourhood, It seems that the City of Burnaby once had plans to turn Brentlawn Drive into a 4-lane street to "improve" traffic.  I would like to think that the following doesn't happen here.

Traffic Counters on Brentlawn Drive

The City of Burnaby had traffic counters set up on Brentlawn Drive and Beta Ave from Tuesday March 27 until some time today.  I wonder how accurate the statistics will be considering that this was done during the first week after Spring Break (when considerable numbers of people are still out of town on trips with their children) and was done for less than 6 days.  For at least 2 of those days, the counter on Beta leading towards Brentlawn Drive was a tangled mess as it had become loose.