After the snows of last week, it is mild today and we are finally getting the patio furniture into the garage for the winter. I suppose it should have been done before now but I think we were hoping for one more day, warm enough to sit out, even if we had to wear coats. Now, we can always get out the folding lawn chairs, I suppose.
Today, I mostly took pix of the bike and foot paths. For years, I have bemoaned the fact that some of these paths are not plowed during the winter, even when there is plenty of evidence that people use them. When especially snippy, I would gripe that you just don't rate unless you have four wheels and an engine.
This morning, as I went over to the college early, I took this photo of the bike path as it bends behind the transit station. Sure enough, there were plenty of footprints but it hadn't been plowed.
Imagine my pleasant surprise to discover, later in the day, that the path had been plowed! This picture was taken looking north, The transit station is on my right and this is the path that goes behind it. I didn't explore to see how far north they had plowed but it looked like it continued on under Baseline at least. They didn't plow the part that curves to link up with the main east-west path, that part I took a photo of this morning, but you could go straight and then make a hard right turn if you were on a bike.
I decided to walk into Centrepointe Park on my way home, to see what was happening there since I hadn't been out on the weekend. I noticed as I got to Centrepointe Drive itself that the centre bollards keeping vehicular traffic off the bike paths had been removed to allow the plows in.
I pushed the signal to stop traffic so I could cross the street and as usual, cars went through on the red light. I guess they think that you can't get out on the road that fast and they have time to sneak through as the light turns red. This woman came barreling in pretty fast and then did stop, but only after she was halfway across the "stop line". I had my camera out to take the previous photo of the missing bollard so I turned around and snapped one of her. I have a theory that it's the speed that makes people even more impatient and warps their judgment.
As I headed toward the park I was surprised to see evidence of plowing. In my more than ten years here, I don't think I have ever seen the park paths plowed, even though a lot of people walk out of the subdivisions behind the park to access the bike path to get to the transit station.
I noticed that some folks had been ready with their cross country skis and had been out enjoying the fresh snow.
And then I saw that the whole of the internal pedestrian path around the park has been plowed! Not very well in spots and there was ice to stumble over, but it's a start. I am happy to see this because I think it encourages people to get out and walk even in the winter and that's a good thing for everybody.
At this point, the person driving the plow got off the path and caught a huge chunk of sod and curled it up like a wave.
Finally, I noticed that someone had been out rolling snow to make a snowman. Given the right conditions next time (the snow has to be the right kind of sticky, for those of you reading who don't live above the 40th parallel), I think I may have to go do that too. It has been years since I made a snowman.
4 comments:
Hi Julia,
First of all let me congratulate you on having this blog. It is very informative and I love the pictures. I was in the park the other morning, and I ran into another lady with a dog. I was mentioning to her how wonderful it was that the pedestrian path around the park was being plowed. She informed me that some of her neighbours approached the City, and requested that the park be plowed. She says that the City has agreed to plow the park for this winter. Concerning your comment on the cars running the red light. I too use this light every day and at least one or two cars run through it every day. This is very dangerous.
Thanks Kathleen! And congrats for managing to get this comment posted. Yay! I wondered why they were plowing the park. I have thought of asking for years if they would and never did it myself. Now I see I should have asked. You learn something new every day!
Wow. I'm going to ask them to plow one of the two bike paths along The Driveway between Fisher and Prince of Wales. It's a vehicle-only road for half the year since it has no sidewalks and they don't plow the bike paths.
Zoom, before I found out they were plowing, and before Kathleen left her helpful info, I was thinking about organizing a petition and getting some sort of critical mass of signatures. On the other hand, you could ask first and see if they need a certain number of requests before doing all that work. Good luck!
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