A CN freight rumbles up to Kennedy on the rail spur just south of Eglinton. It stops. Two men get out. They walk up to Tim’s on the corner of Kennedy and Eglinton. They come back with double-doubles and donuts. The engine starts, the crossing lights flash, and off goes the train through the intersection.
Category: o canada
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burlington beer
I just bought a 12-pack of Nickel Brook Ale from Better Bitters Brewing Co, just near the GO station in Burlington. It’s pretty good. Nice with food.
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TTC Subway Rider Efficiency Guide
The TTC Subway Rider Efficiency Guide is an example of some really helpful nerdiness. I like it.
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hoser cordon bleu reflection, eh
Day-old TimBits have no right to be as tasty as they actually are.
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Burlington doesn’t need another Wal-Mart
I walk past a pleasant green space every day from Burlington Station. I’ve seen deer, groundhogs, Canada geese and even snow geese on this land. It’s pretty.
But Wal-Mart Canada wants to build a huge ugly store on it. The area is zoned for properties up to 5600m2, but this store is more than twice that, at 12000m2 — and yet city staff are recommending approval.
This is craziness, especially since the project will have a parking lot of at least the same size as the store. Who is going to manage the water runoff from that? There will be extra sets of traffic lights, making Brant Street even more stop-go. This is supposed to be a mixed-use development, yet a single behemoth store doesn’t make for much mixing.
The Burlington Downtown Business Association opposes the Wal-Mart proposal, as do many other locals. Burlington has a fine downtown, and it doesn’t deserve a wage-lowering, opposition-closing cheapo crap emporium in its midst.
There will be a a public meeting on May 17, 2005 commencing at 4:00 p.m. in the Council Chambers, Level 2, City Hall, 426 Brant Street to discuss the proposal. Be there, or be stuck with a big grey box.
Here’s the council letter about the Burlington Wal-Mart proposal. It includes diagrams. Full text of it is in the ‘read more’ section.
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wildlife warden
First sighting of one of the Warden TTC groundhogs today. That’s my official indicator of spring.
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CBC.ca = teh b0rken
The RSS subject says: Province says yes to four new power projects.
The page subject says: CBC Toronto – I may quit Liberals: Ontario MP.
But the article says: Freezing rain halts buses. Last Updated Feb 14 2005 08:32 AM EST.
Whhaaaaaaaaaaaaa??
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Canadian Citizenship CIT 0002 Absence Calculator
When you apply for Canadian citizenship, you need to tabulate all your absences from the country in the last four years on the form “Application for Canadian Citizenship — Adults [Form CIT 0002]“. It’s irksome to do this, so here’s Canada_CIT0002_Calculator.sxc; an OpenOffice spreadsheet to do the sums for you.
I’m sure it’s not perfect, but it’s provided for no more reason than to be helpful. If you use it for other people, don’t charge for its use.
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For the TTC strike: ATU 113 – Contact List
Just in case the strike goes ahead, and you need to tell someone exactly how you feel:
Amalgamated Transit Union, Local 113
812 Wilson Avenue
Downsview, Ontario
M3K 1E5Phone: (416) 398-5113
Out of Town: 1-800-245-9929
Fax: (416) 398-4978Note: All correspondence should be addressed to the Secretary-Treasurer.
— from the ATU 113 – Contact List. Bob Kinnear is the president and business agent.
You also might want the TTC Contact Details.
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Toronto transit workers to strike Monday
TTC strike set for Monday. Guess I’ll be using the Brompton.
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bad scene chesterday
A very bad thing happened on the subway yesterday. Whether it was a fire at St George, or some undefined weirdness between Sherbourne and Bay, I don’t know. What I do know, however, is that by 07:55 we were told to get off the train at Chester. 7:55 is the time that my train leaves from Union station, so things were bad already.
Me and several thousand other folks were crammed on the platform at Chester. No-one was going anywhere. There were supposed to be shuttle buses, but there was no movement. People were just on the edge of freaking out, and there were ‘helpful’ suggestions flying about. Things got especially unhinged when extra trains came in, making the platform impossibly crowded.
Then a train came in which wasn’t said to be out of service, so people surged into it. The picture below was nowhere near as crowded as it had been:
So then no-one knew where to go. It seemed that many people were locked by indecision, so when I finally managed to barge my way to the stairs (featuring non-working escalators, crowded with static people):
All told, I was stuck down there for about fifteem minutes. It was very nasty. I’ve never been in such a large crowd in such a small space. Things almost turned ugly.
It did mean I was nearly two hours late for work (streetcar from Broadview got me in five minutes after the 08:43 train had left). I didn’t enjoy a nearly four hour commute.
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3 years
Three years ago today, Catherine and I landed at Pearson airport. And now, like then, it’s snowing. We’ve had a pretty good three years as Permanent Residents.
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Thank You For Not Striking
Thanks, TTC Operators, for not striking tomorrow!
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pretty stinky kitty
We had a huge skunk nosing about the back garden this morning. If they didn’t have the incredible smell potential, they’d be pretty cute.
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Ryan is in the house
My DVD of the Chris Landreth/NFB animation arrived today. I’ve watched it, and the supporting material, several times already. There are so many tiny details in the frames that it’ll take me many viewings to catch even some of them
The closing scene is the most poignant for me, with the fragmented Ryan panhandling outside Schwartz’s on Saint-Laurent. Reflected in the deli’s window is the bold young Ryan of his Street Musique heyday. All the lettering in the Montréal street scene is reversed, as if to say that the reflection is the real world, and what we’re seeing a distorted mirror.
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it’s spring, I think …
These two doos were sat on side fence for ages; long enough for me to get through Catherine’s tax return, and get quite far into mine. They’ve flown off now.
