I’m officially on holidays now until January 7th! No alarm clocks, no deadlines, no meetings, no work, and best of all – no commuting!
So this will [probably] be my last post ranting about OC Transpo or snow removal for sixteen days.
SNOW REMOVAL
I am very curious to know how the City prioritizes snow removal. My neighbourhood is STILL in very rough shape. Last night a sidewalk plow made a half-assed swipe of most of the sidewalks around here.
Around 12:30 pm, I was awoken by the sidewalk plow which was creating a little hill right outside my house. It kept backing up, putting its blade down, and then accelerating into the hill, over and over again. Sometimes the motor would just stop, and he’d have to restart it. And then he just backed up to the end of the block, left the sidewalk, and was last seen whipping down the road, having abandoned his hill of snow right outside my house. It’s still there, waiting for the freezing rain. Thanks Buddy.
The Civic Hospital area, where the big expensive houses are – my goodness, has it ever been nicely manicured by the snow removal teams. Not only are their streets plowed AND their sidewalks plowed, but all their snow has been taken away. The snow banks have been scraped down to the ground and removed. It was all done on Wednesday night. Here it is Friday night, and Carlington’s a mess. James lives in Mechanicsville, and he says it’s a mess too.
So I’m curious. Does the City allocate snow removal resources according to the relative ritziness of different neighbourhoods? Or is it just a coincidence that the higher-income neighbourhoods I pass through have been cleared first and better?
OC TRANSPO
I got to my bus stop at Gladstone and Bank at 4:00 this afternoon, just in time to see a westbound #14 arriving. Excellent timing, I thought. But it was full and it only let a handful of people on. Not me. So I started walking, figuring I’d catch the next westbound 14 that came along. NO WESTBOUND 14 CAME ALONG. I walked the whole hour and twenty minutes without seeing a single westbound 14, even though they’re supposed to come every 15 minutes. During that same period of time, I saw SIX eastbound #14s.
I’m lucky in that I only live 6.5 km from work, and that I’m healthy enough to walk that far. But there are a lot of people who can’t do it, for one reason or another. Frail, elderly, disabled, wheelchaired, baby-strollered people. Not only that, but I just want to get home fast. There are people who need to get where they’re going. Some parents, for example, need to pick up their kids at daycare before the daycare centre closes. (When my son was in daycare, they charged $1 per minute if you were late picking up your child.)
The bus system is becoming reliably unreliable. That storm was five days ago, and public transit is still in chaos. There’s something seriously wrong here.
E-mail your city councillor, regularly, when things come up. Ask her about the snow clearing. She’ll answer or have a staff member answer. And it won’t be long before she remembers who you are. I think you’re in the same riding as I am.
I suspect that the area around the Civic gets cleared because of health care staff, patients parking and walking a few blocks etc. That doesn’t mean your area should be at the bottom of the list. But someone always is.
you must be pretty fit to be walking that far to work and back
Gillian, good idea, I’ll do that.
Nursemyra – fit enough to walk to work, but not fit enough to have a Corset Friday feature on my blog like you do! (By the way – your book arrived yesterday and it looks excellent. Thank you!)
Sooze, do you let your councillor know about your unhappiness with the quality of snow removal…I am sure that people in the Island Park area are very vocal about their displeasure when things aren’t done quickly or well. The squeaky hinge gets the oil.
Gililan and Deb – I took your advice and contacted my councilor, Maria McRae. She got back to me within several hours, and this is what she said:
“Thank you for your e-mail. I have asked Surface Operations staff to attend the Carlington area to work on the sidewalks, etc.
In answer to your question about the hospital area, staff have offered the following response:
“We always do around the hospital first because of the parking for patients families.”
I will do my best to make sure that staff are aware of issues that you raised. I appreciate your patience and if you do not believe that things have improved, please let me know and I will further address the situation.
Wishing you a Merry Christmas and Happy New Year.
With best regards,
Maria”
We all agree that the Civic area, around the hospital, should have priority. But here, we’re talking fancy houses blocks away. Same thing in the Glebe. Fifth Avenue is still a mess even though there is a FIRE STATION on that street. A few blocks down, those fancy streets leading to the canal…you guessed it, clean as a whistle. Of course, they pay 10G and more in taxes every year and are quick to jump on the phone if things pile up. Meanwhile, the elderly who live on the less swanky streets have to struggle and risk injury to get their groceries.
Oh… don’t get me started. I have to walk along Hunt Club Road, and I do mean the road, to get to my bus stop. The sidewalk, which isn’t a sidewalk, but a ‘raised curb’ and therefore does not qualify as requiring sidewalk plowing is covered by a four foot, ok, it’s only a three foot bank of soft, mushy, and dirty snow. I can hardly wait til it turns to ice. OC Transpo does not feel it would be in the best interest of traffic flow to move or add a bus stop, and our councillor ignored the last letters written to her.
My next suggestion to the HSE Committee is that we stage a minor protest by all bus users walking along the road, slowly, to the bus stop, wearing our flourescent vests naturally, about 5:00 p.m.
While the City is scooping up the bodies, they might notice that a safety issue is at stake and clear the sidewalk, or add a bus stop.
Dont’ take up a collection for a memorial donation just yet, our CEO is about to write some letters, we’ll see where that gets us. Perhaps his signature will get more action, being a whole lot swankier and heavy duty than mine. He probably pays higher taxes, too.
Hi Alex – welcome to Knitnut.net! I hope the rain gives you what the City wouldn’t – snow removal and a safe way of getting to and from work. Keep us posted!