Earth Hour 2008

March 29, 2008 - Between 8 and 9 pm tonight, we are asked to turn off all lights and non-essential appliances to mark Earth Hour, an international event that promotes electricity conservation and thus lower carbon emissions. Earth Hour first began in 2007 in Sydney, Australia, and this year, cities around the world are participating in this environmental clause (even google darkened its website to mark the cause).

Enviro-boy here encourages you to do your part by turning off all the lights in your house for just one hour tonight. While this one hour will probably not reduce electricity consumption by THAT much, it will at least be symbolic and raise more awareness on energy conservation.

I'm excited to see all the pictures from this event - it should be interesting to see what downtown will look like completely dark, the first time that it has been since our infamous blackout in 2003.

The New Eiffel Tower?

March 28, 2008 - In celebration of the 120th anniversary of the Eiffel Tower, a French architect submitted his designs of a temporary addition to the Tower's top level observation deck that would dramatically change the shape of the tower.

Initially the media reported that Serero Architects have won the redesign competition and that the addition would be built relatively soon. However, it has been revealed that there was no such competition and there are no plans to redesign the Eiffel Tower. Phew - cause the that new addition (British newspapers called it a "hat") is terribly ugly and would have sparked outrage around the world if it was ever approved!

Civil Servants: We sit around and breathe "each other's exhaust"

March 27, 2008 - Can I say as a civil servant and as part of the Ontario Public Service, I am offended by what our Ontario opposition leader said:

Ontario is already in a recession and needs to look at slashing spending by cutting civil servants who just sit around reading reports and “breathing each other’s exhaust,” Progressive Conservative Leader John Tory said today.

“These kinds of jobs are people who are breathing each other’s exhaust and sitting around, analyzing each other’s papers,” Tory said. “There hasn’t been enough attention paid to looking at whether those people are really making a productive contribution to the effective delivery of public services in Ontario.”

I'm sorry - but the last time I checked, civil servants not only serve the public but we also make politicians, such as Mr. Tory, look good, so they could be re-elected and brag about their achievements. If any politician would like to see whether we sit around and breathe each other's exhaust, he/she should come on over and see how we work around Budget time.

It is definitely not smart to piss off civil servants - just like you should not piss off TTC drivers =D

ROM Crystal - Architectural Wonder of the World?

March 25, 2008 - Talk about some free publicity for the ROM. Conde Nast Traveler's April issue has picked the ROM's Michael Lee-Chin Crystal as one of the "new seven wonders of the architecture world." The other six new wonders are (click links for pictures):

- Cumulus, an exhibit hall at Danfoss Universe, a science and technology museum in Nordborg, Denmark. The building has an irregular roof, all curves and angles, like a bite taken out of a cloud. More pictures here.

- Burj Dubai, the world's tallest building, which is under construction in the Middle East and is already more than 1,700 feet tall. The final height is a secret but its developer, Emaar Properties, has previously said it will stop somewhere above 2,275 feet and will exceed 160 floors.

- London's new Wembley Stadium, which seats 90,000 with no obstructed sight lines. A massive 436-foot-tall, 1,000-foot-long single arch braces the retractable roof. The stadium will be a centerpiece of the 2012 Olympics.

- New Museum of Contemporary Art, designed to resemble an off-kilter stack of silvery rectangles, located on the Bowery on Manhattan's once-seedy, now-trendy Lower East Side.

- Kogod Courtyard, Smithsonian Institution, Washington D.C., a curved roof made from a patterned grid of glass and steel above shallow pools in the courtyard of the Old Patent Office Building, also known as the Reynolds Center and home to the American Art Museum and the National Portrait Gallery.

- Red Ribbon, Tanghe River Park, in Qinhuangdao, China, about 180 miles east of Beijing, a steel bench that resembles a red ribbon and runs a third of a mile through a riverbank garden and ecological oasis.

I'm not sure how these projects were selected (are these new "wonders" that were completed in the past year?). I'm also surprised that none of the Beijing Olympics buildings made the list (i.e. The Bird Nest? The Swimming Cube?). I personally love the Red Ribbon, which not only unifies the vast stretch of parklands along the lush (and heavily polluted) Tanghe River, it also serves as active recreational space for park visitors. Who needs boring park benches and uniform playgrounds when you could have a red ribbon through your park? I also like how the entire bench lights up at night too.

As for whether I think the ROM deserves to make the list - hey any publicity for the ROM is good. Maybe this will encourage more people to visit, so the ROM can finally lower its admission prices!

Is the TTC Dirty, Leaky, and Decaying?

March 9, 2008 - The answer to that question is a big YES. I don't mean to bash the TTC all the time, but even casual riders would know that our transit system is not exactly the "Better Way". This week, the Toronto Star is tackling the deterioration of the TTC in several areas: service, dirt, garbage, escalators/elevators, and repairs.

The Star recently asked readers to provide comments and examples of problems to do with cleanliness, maintenance, and overall appearance of TTC subway stations. You can read them here. I am say that I can personally relate to the majority of these comments, and to add to their list, I want to provide a few more examples:

- Queen's Park Station, east entrances: The entire east side of the mezzanine level of the station floods during rainstorms and snowstorms. You literally have to walk through large puddles of water just to get to the ticket booth. It's slippery and dangerous and I am sure that people have slipped on the floor.

- Eglinton Station, escalator: the fact that it takes 8 months to fix an escalator is pathetic. The escalator that leads from the station to the intersection of Yonge & Eglinton have been out of service since August - and it won't be fixed until April.

- Finch Station, area near the bathrooms: why does the area smell like urine as soon as you get up from the platform level? is air purifier that expensive?

- Osgoode Station, stairs, mezzanine: those slippery stairs after a snowstorm is dangerous and again, the mezzanine level floods and the ceiling leaks almost all the time.

Sure, the problem is not entirely the TTC's fault - passengers must also play their role (but that's another blog). We also know the TTC is cash-strapped, but things like smelly bathrooms and the 8-months time frame to fix an escalator should not be entirely linked to the lack of funding. Is there not some sort of service standards or performance measure currently in place? Are we all asking too much for wanting clean, odour-free and accessible buses, subways, and transit stations? I think not.

Dear Winter

March 8, 2008 - As I write this, we're in white-out conditions here in Markham. It has been snowing for more than 24 hours already, and it doesn't look like it will be stopping anytime soon.

Here's a funny post that I found on the net. I think it pretty much says it all.

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Dear winter:

I am disappointed and horrified at the backstabbing that you've committed. I had been your biggest supporter; pretentiously telling people that I loved winter, thought it was fabulous.

And then you dumped a million feet of snow on me. Most of it today. You've made me late for work, spin out in my car, rip the skin off my hands and fall down.

Fuck off. I'm a summer girl now. In your face.

No love,
Me.

Is TTC Safe Anymore?

March 7, 2008 - With stories of recent TTC muggings on our subway system all over the news, it really makes you wonder if it's safe to ride the subway anymore. The latest crime wave see teenage gang members corner passengers during the afternoon rush hour and rob them of their metropass, cash, ipod, cell phone, and even their blackberrys. The fact that this happens during the busiest time of the day is outrageous and you have to think whether the TTC is doing enough.

In my opinion though, I think crime in public space is unavoidable. There will always be mugging on our streets, in our parks, and on our transit systems. Passengers of course, need to be more vigilant (please tell those rich Asian girls to stop yapping on their million dollar cell phones in public). But can the TTC do more? The CCTV cameras won't come until 2011 (can someone please tell me why it will take so long?), so what other alternatives do the TTC have?

What about those TTC constables? perhaps there needs to be more of them to patrol our stations, our stairways, and maybe even ride our subway cars. Another problem is often, on a train, when a problem occurs, the train pulls into the station and lets passengers off - this then allows the attackers to flee - and by the time the constables reach there, everyone is gone.

It's quite shocking that it has taken this long for the TTC to install cameras at our stations and on our trains and buses. You would think that after Sept 11 and the transit bombings in London and Mardid, the cameras would be up right away. Yeah, the lack of government funding is a problem, but didn't the federal government provide transit security funding? and wouldn't this be more of a priority for the millions of GTAers who ride transit every day? Just a thought...

Disturbing Subway Stories

March 3, 2008 - As an almost daily subway rider, it's very disturbing to read some of these latest incidents on the subway. Sure, they might be isolated - but it does make you think: it could've happened to me. The first story is pretty outrageous. The second one got me thinking: if the TTC knows it's a problem, why won't they do anything about it. Park-at-your-own-risk is a not a very good motto to go for when you're trying to encourage people to get out of the car and "ride the rocket".

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Subway ride darkens as teenagers turn ugly
Joe Fiorito, Toronto Star

My friend Mary was coming from an early morning appointment; now, at 10 a.m., she was on her way to work, heading south on the Yonge line.

She was sitting on a long seat facing the aisle; there was a woman on her left and on her right, in a two-person seat, was a solitary man.

Mary said, "And then seven teenagers – a mix of boys and girls – got on at Bloor."

Here comes trouble.

"Two of the girls – let's say they were 15 years old – crawled over the man and sat down. One girl sat on the other girl's lap. They were laughing, tripping over the man, and I thought, `That's obnoxious; oh, well, they're young, they're just having a good time.'"

Mary went on reading her book.

Hang onto your hat.

"The girl who was sitting on top of her friend began yelling insults at everyone in the car, yelling in my ear, yelling that we didn't know anything about life. She was swearing. I don't recall the words but I thought, `She's got a bad mouth on her.'

"Maybe she was just having a bad day, a fight with her parents, or her boyfriend left her. She was angry and arrogant, too. She told us what a beautiful person she was."

Things got ugly then.

"She started yelling at the man. She called him a pedophile and a racist. He was reading the paper, I think. He hadn't been paying attention."

He paid attention fast.

"The yelling girl said, `I know you're coming to my house tonight to rape me.' The man raised his head and put his head back down again and she kept at him. Finally he said, `I'm not any of those things. I don't know why you're saying that.'"

The whole car, wondering the same thing.

Mary said, "I thought there probably wasn't anything any one of us could say to her, or she'd turn on us with an attack. I could feel the colour rising in my cheeks. The man was very mild but he'd obviously been stung.

"The woman beside me came to his defence. She said, `Why are you yelling at him? You don't know him.' The girl said to her, `You're a bitch.' I don't remember all the insults. At one point I said, `Maybe if we lowered our voices we'd all calm down.'"

The girl would not calm down.

"The tallest of the boys turned to the woman and told her to be quiet, there was nothing she could do, that she wasn't doing anything with her life.

"Finally, one of the boys – I wish I could tell you which one – and I've thought so much about this – threw a first punch, and the punches passed over my head. I reached up and pressed the yellow emergency bar. I didn't see the man get hit."

The train stopped at the College station. The kids fled through the crowd. Mary said, "The man's glasses were broken. There was blood all over his face."

Mary had some water and someone else had paper towels. They cleaned the man's face as best they could. And the police and the paramedics came and they made sure he was okay, and the man went on his way. Mary said, "A couple of us talked afterwards. We didn't know if the kids had weapons."

She went to work; she walked. She is still angry, still upset; she still wonders if there was anything else she might have done. I think not. It happened much too fast and yes, those kids had a weapon.

Teenaged rage.

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TTC's parking-lot logic baffles car theft victim
Joe Fiorito, Toronto Star

Nusrat Fatima drove to the city on a Saturday morning earlier this month. She lives in Markham. She works downtown. She came in with her daughter, who had an appointment in the city.

Nusrat pulled into the lot at the Finch station and parked the car, and she and her daughter rode the subway downtown. At the end of the day, they went north again, got off at Finch, walked to the lot and ... wait a minute, where's the car?

I met her in the passenger pick-up area of the Finch station the other day – she had come in on the bus – and she showed me where her car had been.

She said, "I remember looking around. I was thinking, 'Oh my God, there are not many cars.' I tried to see where it might be. I was panicking. I was angry. My daughter said, 'Oh, mom, you're always forgetting.' I said to her, 'But you were with me.' "

Her car is a Toyota Corolla, silver, licence AXAR 616. Dangling from the rear-view mirror, a small deodorizer in the shape of an earthen pot.

She said, "I looked around for a towing number in case it had been towed, but there was no number. Then I called my nephew. He said he would come right away. My sister also came. In the end there were five of us searching all the lots. Then I called the police. They took all my information and they gave me a number to quote and told me to call my insurance. The insurance said okay, somebody will call you back."

The trip into town used to take her 25 minutes by car. The bus into town takes 45 minutes; the bus home takes an hour. She gets up at 5:45 a.m. She gets home around 7 p.m. That's a long day.

She said, "I had to get a hard copy of the incident report for the insurance. It cost me almost $40 for a piece of paper. I said to the police that I was the victim. They said I'd get the money back. So I paid it."

She said, "The insurance called me a while ago and asked if the car was found. I started laughing."

She has not rented another car; the thought of leaving a vehicle in that lot has got her spooked. What will she do now? She shrugged.

"I can't afford to buy a new car."

She will wait to see what kind of deal the insurance company will offer.

Here's what bothers her:

"I called the TTC and asked if they had a camera there. They said no. I said, 'How come?' Because at Finch station there are many cars; every day cars are stolen. They said 'You park at your own risk.'"

Nusrat smiled a bitter and emphatic smile. "If there are cameras, people will refrain from stealing." She is right; theft of cars from public lots is one of the few things security cameras actually deter.

"I told the TTC that I park at the far end of the lot. I said, 'If I get killed, you have no cameras.' They said, 'That's your tough luck.' They actually said that to me."

A spokesperson for the TTC said there is a five-year plan to put cameras in subway stations and on subway and streetcars, and also on buses. Parking lots?

Use at your own risk.