O O Ø O O O O
Retarded
Calgary is retarded. No, I’m not merely being offensive. When I look it up, I see this:
“re’tard’ed (adj) Occurring or developing later than desired or expected; delayed.”
Calgary, for reasons I can’t fathom, seems unable to follow the good examples of other cites in this fine nation; or on the planet. I’m pretty sure I knew this already, but have lived with it for so long, I could no longer see it. Then I went on conference in my own city, and had the foreign attendees open my eyes for me.
A Smokin’ Good Time
Can we fix the damned smoking laws? Quebec just went non-smoking for goodness sake. Have you ever been to Quebec? Even the pets smoke there. If they can ban smoking in public places, certainly we can.
Would you like to know how ridiculous we look in the eyes of the world? Consider this: in the nice patio-weather evening, smokers huddle inside the door of my favorite pub. Downtown, Smokers get up from their seats on the patio, walk two feet away to the sidewalk, and light up. At the Calgary Folk Fest, the beer garden — the one place where minors are not allowed — is the one place you’re not allowed to smoke. Sure, you’re asked not to smoke in the main seating bowl, but that’s not bylaw enforced. Once again, smokers get up and walk to the other side of the fence to have a puff.
And to cap it all off, a pair of my friends were not allowed at a downtown restaurant (even on the patio) because they allowed smoking, and my friends had a baby with them. Yes, they have a patio, and of course, you can’t smoke there, but you had to walk through the restaurant to get to it, so babies were verboten.
The smoking laws in this city are ridiculous. Just ban smoking in public places, like every other jurisdiction in Canada. Stop putting it off until after the next election. It’s not a controversial decision. It’s a damned obvious one.
And while I’m on the subject of downtown patios:
Tumbleweeds and Diesel Fumes
Once the work day ends, Calgary’s downtown is dead. It got to the point where fellow conference-goers, imprisoned in a downtown hotel, complained there was nothing for them to do but watch the tumbleweeds.
Now I realize that a city can’t simply force its inhabitants to start hanging out downtown, but couldn’t it start by not driving them away—literally?
I was sitting on a patio last Friday, drinking a beer and watching the pretty people wander by, when all of a sudden, someone moved a gate and traffic started flowing down the once-pedestrian corridor of 8th Avenue. Suddenly, the pretty people were gone, and the patios started to smell of exhaust and diesel fumes. Within minutes, downtown was empty again.
It was 6 o’clock on a Friday night, sunny, and almost 30 degrees out.
Once upon a time, there may have been a valid reason for wanting to clear people off of 8th avenue at 6pm. Once upon a time, 8th Avenue was a lot more run-down. This is no longer the case. Allowing traffic at all, let alone while the sun shines, down drives the downtown population away.
Stop driving people out of downtown. Perhaps that way they will want to stay. It will certainly make our tourists more happy.
Garbage-In Garbage-Out
At some point during the week, I was caught throwing out a pop can. I explained to my fellow conference-goer that Calgary doesn’t have a convenient recycling program, and that when downtown it was just as efficient to throw your cans out, letting the homeless pick them out the garbage (though being a nice kind of guy, I usually place my can on top, or below the actual receptacle to make collection easier). My fellow conference-goer was incredulous.
“Doesn’t every city have a recycling program?”
Apparently not. Though every other city in the world has been able to pull one off, Calgary was still studying how to implement curbside recycling. Sure, city council recently voted to bring one in starting in 2009 (after the next city election), but even after a two-year pilot it doesn’t have a clue how much such a program is going to cost.
This is dumb. Essentially every other major city in the world knows how to recycle. Presumably one of them has come up with a reasonably cost-effective way of pulling it off. Waiting another 3 years to even start is just dumb. It is silly and lazy, just like our approach to the smoking issue. Just like our approach to getting people downtown.
Actually, you know what would be a better word for it?
“Retarded.”
Kjell Wooding
June 6, 2006
OOØOOOODCCLVII
June 7th, 2006 at 9:17 am
Why is this not in letter format addressed to the City? Get on it!
June 10th, 2006 at 9:43 pm
I was in Saskatoon this week. I sat in a pub and failed to notice the lack of smoke odour until I noticed a few people seemed to be entering a couple times. It was then pointed out to me that people are not allowed to smoke in the pub. They are allowed to smoke right outside the damn doors though. I walk through a crowd of them when I left.
In other news (and back in Calgary) someday I want to live in a neighbourhood where I don’t smell marijuana on a regular basis.
I was talking to a guy operating the truck that empties the cardboard recycling bins at the local shopping mall. He said they emptied that bin 3 or 4 times every Saturday.
July 21st, 2006 at 6:53 pm
He empties those bins four times on saturday because there are SO FEW OF THEM in the city. Calgary IS retarded, and they need to address the patio no smoking bylaw as well.