Paper craft air force one

Navigator Ltd. represents Adam Giambrone

A letter to Adam Giambrone:

Hello Councillor,

Your choice of hiring Navigator Ltd. is an endorsement of their actions; by paying them to look after your campaign you are implicitly saying that that their past actions were acceptable. As such, you support an attack on the little guy to protect the established interests. Bryant's actions weren't just reprehensible, but they were a perfect example of exactly what's wrong with government and politics: looking out for the cultural elites, while forcing the populace pay with their lives and health.

It was wrong for Bryant to perpetrate a smear job on his deceased victim, and it is wrong for you to support the people that he paid to do it.

A week ago I was hoping that you'd declare your intention to run for mayor. Your work with the Toronto Cycling Committee and the TTC, and your experience on council made you a much more attractive candidate than the other candidates who have declared, but I demand better from the candidate who will receive my vote.

This is, of course, about Giambrone's decision to be represented by Navigator Ltd..

George Smitherman and Rocco Rossi, the Cycling Antagonists"

A letter to the star

I've been pretty upset with the usage of the term "war on cars." Today I read this opinion in the Star, in an article "Time to stop nutty war on cars":

As I inched my car along Wellesley St. East in morning traffic earlier this week, I watched a lone bicyclist merrily speed by me in his designated bike lane.

For cyclists like him, the recently installed bike lane on Wellesley is a welcome development.

But for fuming motorists like me, the bike lane is an unmitigated disaster because it has narrowed the street, slowing traffic and significantly increasing commuting time. And then there's all the extra pollution caused by having our cars and trucks stuck longer in traffic.

The Wellesley bike lane – used only by that one cyclist as I sat idling in traffic – is just another scrimmage in the rapidly escalating "war on cars" raging these days across Toronto.

This is bullshit! Many have pointed out that the war analogy is offensive; nothing remotely resembling a war is happening in Toronto, least of all traffic-wise. Since they've started using this term, I have noticed that drivers are acting out their frustrations more against cyclists. To me, there seems to be an obvious connection between a group being told that they are at war and an increase in violence from that group.

I sent this letter to the Star:

The phrase "war on cars" is being used frequently in the local media to describe some restrictions on driving. The use of the expression is not only offensively inaccurate, but also dangerous.

This term implies a violence that was not part of this discussion a month ago. Since the term became popular, I've noticed a dramatic increase both in the number and in the severity of incidents of aggressive drivers threatening me with their vehicles.

I used to encounter only one or two aggressive or threatening drivers per week during commutes or other recreational cycling. Now it is more often a daily event. A group of people is repeatedly being told that they are at war; the increase in violence from this group is natural.

Please stop referring to the democratically enacted replanning of a small number of streets and intersections as a war. You are imparting a violence into the discussion that has the potential to harm people.

The image is modified from barn with old car by lapstrake.

Bells on Bloor - 2009

This years Bells on Bloor ride was a load of fun. The city'll be installing a little over 4 Km of bike lanes on Bloor this year (supposedly), and they are doing a study on doing bike lanes on the whole thing. We're making progress.

If you're interested in really cool things, check out the big version of my stitched image of the large group of cyclists at Queen's Park.

Critical Mass (of police) May '09

Unfortunately, Mass was besieged by police again this month. They only seem to come out to bug us in the summer months.

They don't like fun.

I overheard one of them justifying their party-poopery saying that they were just enforcing the law. If so, they should then have given us all tickets for tail gating, and noise violations. The goal wasn't to enforce the law, but to discourage cycling advocacy. What else is new?

Other than the preponderance of negative Nellies, it was a great Mass, with tonnes of energy and hundreds of folks out to have a safe, respectful good time. Too bad that Dredd & Co. showed up.

Too Bad Not To Fail

In November, I explained why I think that at least one major car manufacturer should be allowed to go bankrupt. I don't wish any financial hardship on the workers in the manufacturing jobs at these companies, but human civilization requires are large scale modal shift away from automotive and airplane-based transportation.

With our ignorant and corrupt government, we have no chance of making investments that will lead us in this direction, but south of the border, there is (the tag-lined) Hope.

Aside from the fact that GM is looking at filing for bankruptcy, the Obama administration is making huge investments in high speed rail. This is great news for the environment (and the economy). This map is very exciting (from Climate Progress, but very similar to one in this week's The Economist):



From the standpoint of a Canadian, it's nice to see Montreal an Vancouver connected. There is also talk of connecting Detroit to Toronto, which would be nice. I also like how the partitions of this network are shown to be so easily connected. If GM were to fail, and their ex-workers were to work on a national high speed train system, things would start to look a lot better for the environment.

Update from Adrian Heaps' Office

I just got a reply to my letter about snow in bike lanes from Adrian Heaps' assistant Diane Hilliard:

Thank you for your note. This year, there is a pilot project to clear a specific bike lane; the Martin Goodman Trail. This 'trial run' will be reviewed by staff to allow for more designated north-south, east-west routes are added next year.

We continue to work with Transportation staff to effectively clear all roadways however, are unable to delegate specific 'bike lanes' at this point.

Thank you for your patience as we work through this.

Regards,

Letter to Adrian Heaps re Snow in Bike Lanes

It has been quite an ordeal biking to work this year. The extreme cold is a serious deterrent. Being outside in -20 windchill is painful for any exposed skin.

Another serious problem is that the bike lanes haven't been cleared of snow again this year. I have noticed this on College, St. George and Harbord. For a cyclist, there are two options for dealing with the snowy lanes:

1. One could ride through the 1" - 2" of ice, snow and slush that is in most of the bike lanes. This is a laborious way to get around. The snow has the consistency of smooth peanut butter; it coats your wheels and greatly increases rolling resistance. The dirty snow on the tire generally flies off in all directions, doing it's best to create a mess of the bike and the rider's clothes.
2. One could ride farther into traffic. This is great when there are no cars around, but an alarmingly high portion of the motorist population is hostile to having a bike come out into "their lane." Hostile drivers will often pass cyclists and leave very little margin for error (often less than a foot). This is dangerous behaviour, especially so in the winter when it's possible for a cyclist to hit a block of ice and travel that distance sideways with little notice.

The obvious solution to the problem is to keep the bike lanes cleared of snow. One of the committees at city hall said last year that a better job would be done keeping the bike lanes cleared. Of course, it's not happening. Because of this, I decided to send an email to the head of cycling affairs at city hall, Adrian Heaps:

Hello, Councillor Heaps,

Biking to work recently has not been very easy due to the large amount of snow in the bike lanes on Harbord, College, and St. George. I understood that more effort was going to be put into keeping these lanes cleared this year.

Would you please see what can be done about having the bike lanes around town cleared?

Thanks,

We'll have to see if the letter makes any difference. I haven't had any luck with these in the past.

The image of a snowy bike lane is from BikePortland.org.

Pig in a Poke

Cars are deleterious in so many ways that it is imperitive that as a society we curb their use. Providing adequate cycling infrastructure is only one small way in which such a positive change can be brought about. Improvements in the pedestrian realm, and regional and inter-regional transit improvements are also important.

It is clear that, while these measures would have a positive impact, more needs to be done to curb automobile use. Cars remain a cheap and convenient way of travelling. Financial disincentives should be applied to motorists, and the resulting funds should be diverted to fund further projects. Usage fees like per mile insurance or road tolls seem attractive to those interested in restructuring the transportation system.

However, there is never the political will to "do the right thing," and there is a reason for this. Any pressure from the government to get people out of cars is met with stiff resistance from the automotive and oil sectors. Large corporations operate within a financial system that sees a shrinking business as a poor investment. Even a modest 1 or 2 percent reduction in car use translates to a 1 or 2 percent reduction in sales, which would be disastrous for car manufacturers and their suppliers. These companies hold considerable political power, both in management, through lobbying, and through labour representatives who speak for large voting blocks.

Crass as it may sound, the current financial crisis provides an opportunity for change. The automotive industry is in a state of flux, and will require significant investment and grants from the government to stay in business (to the tune of billions). Because the government holds more sway than it usually does in this situation, the time to curb automotive use is now.

This could be as simple as allowing one of the big three automakers to fail. If this were to happen, there would be a large production shortfall, accompanied by a weakening of the labour and lobbyist voices. Rather than insure the car companies the government could insure the workers benefits and pensions, and put that money into factories producing environmentally friendly replacements for cars (e.g. trains). Cars companies that stay in business could be given bail-out money on the basis of producing more ecologically sound products (e.g. plug-in hybrids). Doing so would provide employment for the laid off workers.

In the long term, such a plan is definitely worth the short term unpleasantness. To curb aoutomobile use, letting a major automotive manufacturer fail is a small concession. The suffering from this could be minimized with the proper government funding. In the face of peak oil and global warming, there should be no doubt that the ends justify the means.

Email to Mario Silva and Joe Flaherty

I've just sent this to my MP and cc'ed the finance minister, in response to and article regarding the potential sale of government assets:

Hello, Mario Silva,

I am a constituent of your riding and I do not support the privatization of crown corporations. There is a long history showing that this course of action generally benefits a rich minority in the long term, and benefits the public only in the short term.

Minister Flaherty should remember a similar situation when the 407 was sold under the Harris Government. This was not advantageous for the people of Toronto, who have seen increased tolls, while they amount paid for the highway is many times what is estimated to be worth.

Similar case studies of selling government assets can be seen if you look at the reform of the Chilean government in the 1970s or the reform of the Russian government in the 1990s. In both of these cases, there was a "shot in the arm" for the government coffers after selling government assets, but in the long term the people ended up paying more for the services which were privatized (and sold for much less than they were worth).

The privatization of the CBC is a particularly ghastly notion. This Conservative government seems hell-bent on depleting Canadian culture.

Please do not support these actions.