Wants trail access
Dear Editor:
There have been meetings and discussions regarding Pearle Hospitality since the June 30 public meeting. It was very clear at that meeting that the citizens of Elora have major concerns with the development. I do believe Pearle got the message loud and clear. They will be reworking the plan. We shall wait and see if all of our concerns will be addressed.
But the one thing that has been bothering me for years is the lack of access to the trail and river as well as a proper view of The Tooth of Time.
It sounds like it could be up to 10 years or more before the entire public trail system will be completed.
I am hoping that with the near completion of the Pottery building that perhaps Pearle can make a section of the trail from that building accessible to the public. Perhaps access from Wellington Road 7 and fencing off the site from that point would allow public access along the trail and down to the river. It would be a show of good faith to this community. We have been denied access already for many years and another 10 years or more is way too long.
It is time we are all granted some form of access to our promised trail.
Please, let’s try to make this happen in the very near future.
Linda Lane,
Elora
‘No longer trusted’
Dear Editor:
RE: Greedy group, July 29.
I would agree that council is allowing too much development to take place in Centre Wellington, mainly because the existing infrastructure is not capable of dealing with it.
The latest plans regarding “bypass roads” is nothing short of “insane” and shows that this council can no longer be trusted with our future. All they want to do is shift the traffic burden onto other neighborhoods, instead of positively dealing with it. We need a bypass that goes well clear of all our residential areas and prevent the destruction of our trees, heritage sites, fish/wildlife areas and, of course, our sanity.
We really do not want to listen to any more noisy speeding cars going by that our undermanned police force already seems unable to stop. We have seen “paid parking” introduced and next it will be yet more “flower pots before seniors trying to park and go for lunch”.
Malcolm McCulloch,
Fergus
‘Lowering the bar’
Dear Editor:
RE: Group tries to address wastewater plant concerns, Aug. 5.
It’s difficult to become even more disheartened with Erin Mayor Alls and his council over the wastewater treatment plant, but every so often he manages to lower the bar even further.
This latest approach by the Coalition for the West Credit River was well thought out with one goal in mind: to collaboratively save the trout, hence the river, whilst providing waste water treatment facilities to a growing town. Why are they doing this? They give a damn!
Despite all the preaching by Alls and the Town of Erin (ie. “the best waste treatment technology money can buy”), they refuse to put their “money where there mouth is” and guarantee this best technology will prevent any disastrous effects on a pristine, “blue-ribbon trout stream.”
Furthermore, I’m concerned with Alls’ comment “we’re honouring what the provincial government told us we had to go through in our EA”. He goes on to say “We can’t go outside of that; that’s a guideline that we have to honour.” Honour what? If the guidelines aren’t sufficient we can’t question those guidelines? True leadership, i.e., those we voted in, would have no hesitation in questioning those guidelines, no matter what. It’s what a true democracy is all about.
The simple fact is we haven’t been presented with any “guarantees,” nor has Alls, or anyone for that matter, ever told us the “brookies” will be fine. They can’t even agree to keep the effluent temp limit below the critical 19C. But he did say if the temp becomes a problem the town will “look after it.” How? For a town that is severely struggling to come up with the money to pay for this treatment facility, wouldn’t it be better to have all the necessary “specs” agreed upon and “engineered” prior to breaking ground?
It has been in my experience that its much better to do the right thing for the environment at the beginning than to apply very costly “Band-Aids” afterwards. Enviro-solutions can be very simple. Just observe what Mother Nature has done in the 4.5 billion years of planetary evolution.
Unfortunately, Mother Nature never planned for humans and believe me she’s got her work cut out for her today.
Brett Davis,
Orton
Speeding in Orton
Dear Editor:
We have complained about the traffic on the Erin/Garafraxa townline – the first time on July 27, and nothing has been done to date. So we decided that more people should read about this too.
On Aug. 4 between 2 and 3pm, there were five semi-trailers, 10 straight trucks, two dump trucks and the rest cars. A grand total of 91 vehicles in one hour coming along the townline [east and west]. Speed through our little hamlet is 50km/h; very few were travelling that speed. There is a mobile sign just by the hydro line on the townline – shows you the speed you are doing, when travelling west bound. That is not the end of the day, can you imagine how many vehicles are going along our road.
And they have to go all the way out to Wellington Road 26 because at Sideroad 10 and Dufferin Road 3 the road was closed heading west on Dufferin 3. No one is paying attention to the detour signs, because they should be going south from Dufferin 3 to 22 just south of Hillsburgh.
On July 30 when we were coming home, we were doing 50km/h and some idiot in a black pickup went sailing by us; the mobile sign showed 93km/h! They never slowed down, only sped up to 96.
There is a dinky sign that is placed on the corner of Erin/Garafraxa townline facing eastbound, has been pushed off to the side – no one is paying attention. There was one car on Aug. 4 that was a complete blur as it traveled eastbound about 10am. People just don’t care.
We have asked for speed humps at either end of the hamlet, has it been done. Nope!
Speed humps are in Alton and it slowed truck traffic and some cars down alot. Speed humps in Belfountain tell us why not in Orton? Or better yet, put a traffic ticket camera here! Or maybe the OPP can have more of a presence in Orton when us folks call and complain about the speed, not the dinky sign that says your speed.
I’m going to quote a sign I saw today: “Cats have 9 lives, people just 1”. Please slow down, folks. We don’t need an animal, child or adult injured cause of the speeds we’ve seen the last few weeks.
Sandy and Neil Blahut,
Orton
Good money after bad
Dear Editor:
RE: ‘A liveable world’, July 15.
Interesting to read Mr. Moore’s description of how his home’s solar power helps his power bills and saves the world from his own property – commendable?
My irritation is with our main grid power production. At that level major suppliers of wind turbine/solar (WT/S) cannot match the cost/efficiency of clean power available in our homes’ power sockets. WT/S power sources are the most expensive, unreliable and inefficient.
The sun in Canada is hardly overpowering. Developing batteries large/efficient enough to smooth out unreliable WT/S power issues is decades away – ask Texas?
Canada’s power is way “greener” than any other G20 Nation. Our politicians/public need to be wiser, honest and promote the truth. Media should amplify this as well, instead of promoting false, naive and wrong-headed views that WT/S power will be our environmental saviour. It will not be!
McGinty’s WT/S experiment will add ‘“excess” costs more than $135B between 2015-35 for less than 5% of our power. Captive power users pay those costs – true everywhere excessive use of WT/S power facilities has occurred. Germany proves this with the highest power rates in the G20.
We could have installed other power systems with zero CO2 emissions, but whacky environmental groups like Sierra Club and the David Suzuki Foundation disagree. Oddly, those WT/S-loving lobby groups are against clean, reliable power systems (nuclear and hydro).
Of course, citizens can install whatever they want on their own property, but it will make negligible difference to overall emissions in the long run given our clean base power.
Financially, we have all taken a massive hit in this past year from COVID-19 and we cannot afford to throw good money after past bad spending on unreliable power systems. Better solutions exist!
Mike Hall.
Guelph/Eramosa
Against rezoning
Dear Editor:
I represent a group of concerned citizens (Jones Baseline Community) who are currently working to stop a zoning change in Guelph/Eramosa Township.
Many of us have purchased our “forever home,” eyes wide open knowing that the surrounding areas are zoned agricultural and even environmentally protected land in Guelph/Eramosa Township. Many family homes already surround this parcel of land with kids playing and dogs barking and chickens clucking.
What many of us did not know was municipalities around Ontario use a process called the “County Official Plan” (COP) which designates the future zoning of the land around you. So imagine to our surprise when very good prime agricultural land is being requested to be turned into industrial land. The township has already designated this prime agricultural land for industrial applications!
Minus Forty, which specializes in manufacturing self-contained energy efficient freezer/refrigerator merchandise, presently located in Georgetown, has taken advantage of this future zoning plan (COP). Acquiring the land at dirt cheap cost and applying for the rezoning change to build a 15,234m2 manufacturing facility in phase one with 11 loading docks and 242 parking spots. Additional 90,000m2 for additional expansion on some 27 acres of land is also proposed. But what drives the issue is the land acquisition, then why do we have industrial parks?
Not so great for jobs either as the facility is relocating from Georgetown; add that to the loss of good productive farm land. If this can happen to us here it can happen anywhere. If not a building perhaps hydro towers or a quarry or even a highway. Speciality companies look to these COP’s for opportunities to grab land at low prices because the farmer was not able to sever his own land or sell it to a developer because it had already been designated (COP) as future industrial zone, as opposed to residential or commercial.
The impact is tremendous starting from increased traffic in the area, higher noise levels, potential loss to property owners in the area (evaluations), water management – which has been a big concern to all of us well owners that count on the aquifer to supply us with that all so important clean drinking water.
As big a concern is, why here? Looking at the threat level to the water table, the area is rated at the highest risk according to documents provided by the county. So how much “due diligence” goes into making future zoning choices when you pick an area with a high threat level to drinking water and environmentally protected land as per the Grand River Conversation Authority?
Help us get the word out and to stop the zoning change. Look us up on Facebook or Instagram: Search- Jones Baseline Community Group.
Dan Mallette,
Guelph/Eramosa
Can’t buy happiness
Dear Editor:
We are living our daily lives almost as usual while our planet quickly dies by poison, fire, flood, greed and by the cold calculation of huge companies that are doing most of the destruction. But we can’t point the finger at them and accuse them of doing it alone!
No, we are supporting them to do it by actively looking for happiness in the objects of their making. We think we need a new TV or we won’t be happy. We need a new set of kitchen cupboards or we won’t be happy. We need a new car or we won’t be happy … even though all those things are a replacement for perfectly functioning possessions that we have already.
We are looking in the wrong place for our happiness. We soon find out that the happiness fades as we sit watching big companies tell us that we need a newer something to make us happy. And we are listening.
That kind of jolt; watching our new car pull up into the driveway or the 72” TV being installed over the fireplace lasts until your child develops asthma from playing hockey in closed arenas, or your mother comes down with COVID-19 because we have degraded the environment enough to develop exotic diseases, or you have a heated argument with your partner over the colour of your new car. Can your new TV make that better? We have been sold a lifestyle that is killing us and we are going meekly to the slaughter along with our beautiful planet …our home.
According to Smithsonian Magazine, “…a team of scientists calculated that in 2020, human-made materials reached 1.1 trillion tons, exceeding the mass of all living things on the planet, which includes people, bacteria, plants and animals combined.”
You don’t have to be a scientist to get that we can’t keep going like this and give all children a world that feeds them and gives them space to grow and flourish if we keep basing our economies on greed and persuasion to want more … of everything!
Let’s regain our grandparents’ outlook on life, “If you possibly can, fix it. If you can’t, find another creative use for it. If you have no need for it, share it with others. Put it in the attic or the barn until you can find a way to repurpose it.” We have been sold the absurd idea that the supply of material things is unlimited. So how do you keep that going on a limited planet? No matter what the media says about Bezos’s or Branson’ s ideas of space travel, this is it. There is no planet “B”!
Get your real and lasting high from kindness, honesty, serving others, taking care of the planet you live on. That kind of high is more lasting, more satisfying, and offers you a steady stream of genuine happiness.
Gerry Walsh,
Erin