Mike Farwell

I meant to update this space yesterday, my first day back from holidays, but time simply did not allow. Funny, though, how a week away can feel so long. I guess that means it was time well spent.I started my week away up at the cottage in Port Elgin. I had not visited in years (I had decided long ago I was just too busy for such things) and I realize now what a mistake that was. Nothing says relaxation like being steps away from the water.

I ended the week in New York City, taking in a game at fabled Yankee Stadium. As a bit of a baseball nut, this was akin to a pilgrimage for me. And one that had to be taken this year, what with the new stadium opening in the spring of 2009. According to the big countdown board in centre field, I saw one of the final 19 games in The House That Ruth Built. Not too shabby. And despite what you may have heard, New Yorkers are a fine group of people. They were, to a person, much friendlier than I had anticipated and there really wasn’t a time I felt unsafe, including while walking back to my hotel in Queens after the game, at 2 AM. I’d take the trip again in a heartbeat.

It’s good to be back, though. We’ve got Canada’s medal woes to worry about here at home (or have we stopped worrying now?), not to mention a possible ban on bottled water that comes before regional council again in a few short weeks. The city of Kitchener is looking at ways to generate new interest in its struggling downtown market, a windmill debate rages in Waterloo, and Cambridge has the first Gold standard City Hall in the country. In other words, lots to talk about. Let’s get started catching up. I’ll bring the coffee.

I just wanted to say thanks to all of you who took the time to call and e-mail over the past couple of weeks as I filled in on the Gary Doyle Show. I love getting the chance to fill-in on our talk shows and the interaction with you makes it all the more fun for me.

When I grow up, I hope to be just like Gary…and on vacation for most of the summer! I’m taking a week for myself next week as Gary’s journey to parts unknown continues for another week still (how many is that now, Gary? I’ve lost track.). In our absence, we leave you with the delightful (and incomparable) Susan Cook-Scheerer. I trust you will enjoy one another’s company.

I’ll rejoin you August 18th on the Afternoon News with Kate Stockmann. Until then…

Do you remember that classic song by Kermit the Frog, “It’s Not Easy Being Green?” Far be it from me to argue with a muppet but the famous amphibian may have had it all wrong. In fact, all around Waterloo Region the signs are saying that being green may be pretty easy indeed.

To wit, the new City Hall in Cambridge, designated this week as the first city hall in the country to achieve GOLD certification for Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design — or LEED — from the Canada Green Building Council. The new building incorporates a number of environmentally-friendly features, such as motion sensors to reduce the use of artificial lighting, a living wall that helps circulate clean air throughout the building and a green roof, just to name a few.

In Kitchener, the new Hanson Avenue Arena and Recreational Complex will be built to LEED Gold while in Waterloo, Mayor Brenda Halloran promised in her state of the city address this year that Waterloo would pursue LEED Silver for every new municipal building bigger than 500 square metres.

But I think that’s where the easy part ends. For while it’s one thing to talk the green talk, if you will, it’s entirely another to walk the green walk. To wit, in Waterloo, where the design for a new east side fire station came forward – aiming for LEED Silver — and was promptly sent back to the drawing board because going green, it would seem, has its price. And The Bay in Waterloo will now appeal to the Ontario Municipal Board after city staff shot down the store’s request to erect wind towers. It seems the city’s concerns for aesthetics and pedestrian safety trump its concern for the environment.

In Kitchener, while there seems to be a willingness to meet the price for going green on Hanson Avenue, there’s also a movement afoot to build a new downtown parking structure that will simply attract more cars to the core but do nothing to improve transit to the centre of the city. And even Cambridge, while patting itself on the back for its new city hall, has joined other municipalities in banning environmentally-friendly e-bikes from its sidewalks and trails. There is simply more to being green than building — or promising to build — environmentally-friendly buildings. More cost, yes, but also more effort and perhaps a little more creative thinking.

Maybe Kermit needs to update his classic tune to “It’s Not Inexpensive Being Green.” Although research does tell us that the up front costs of going green can be recouped through less expensive operational costs down the road, in some cases even tipping the project into a favourable financial position. In other words, you get more back than you put in up front. Don’t we owe it to ourselves to make the investment?

In light of recent events, Greyhound Canada has pulled a new ad campaign. The promotion, which included posters and ads in handbooks at universities, aimed to remind people that the stress of commuting could be reduced by taking the bus. In what seemed clever at the start of the campaign, the posters promoted the slogan “There’s a reason you’ve never heard of bus rage.” Greyhound is doing the proper — and sensitive — thing by pulling the ads. But the online petition to beef up security at Greyhound terminals, now 600 signatures strong, is entirely misguided.

Drunk drivers are responsible for an average of four deaths in Canada every year, yet we still take to our cars and hit the road in record numbers. There were 594 murders reported in Canada last year, but we still walk the streets. We walk those same streets, every day, despite the number of pedestrians who get hit by cars. I recall a time in the summer of 2006 where as many as eight pedestrians here in Waterloo Region were struck in a two week period, some of them fatally. Lightning kills ten people in Canada every year, yet we still go out in the rain. In all of my 30+ years on this planet, I have heard of one beheading aboard a bus. One.

In no way am I trying to make light of this senseless tragedy. But if you think this is a story about bus safety, you’re not thinking at all.

It was 1963 when my favourite songwriter penned the lyrics to a classic tune. Bob Dylan wrote ”The line it is drawn, the curse it is cast; the slow one now, will later be fast. As the present now will later be past, the order is rapidly fadin’. And the first one now will later be last, for the times they are a-changin’.” And so the changes continue.

Last week, in the wake of a 286-million dollar federal government buyout for tobacco farmers, a spokesperson said the deal signalled “the beginning of the end of a way of life for generations of tobacco farm families.” At the same time, we’re watching General Motors attempt to buy out the contracts of 2600 workers at a truck plant in Oshawa, and we’ve heard countless auto workers talk about how their industry is not one they’d recommend to their kids. The times they are a-changin’ indeed.

It seems to me that in each of these cases, we are bearing witness to the end of an era. We may not be in the final generation of tobacco farmers or auto workers but the writing appears to be rather clearly etched on the wall. How many future generations can there be? In my own experience, I know that blacksmiths at one time practiced a trade that was in great demand. But I cannot claim to have known a blacksmith personally, nor am I able to trace my ancestry to the time when the Farwell family was heavily involved in the trade. How many more generations will it be before we’re talking in the same tones about tobacco farmers and auto workers, considering them relics of a bygone era?

It’s been said that the only thing constant in life is change. But that doesn’t mean we can’t mourn the inevitability of it from time to time.

I spent a lot of my youth reading Stephen King horror novels. Some of my adulthood, too, in fact. But if King ever wrote of a man who decapitated a fellow passenger on board a bus in an unprovoked, seemingly random attack, I can’t remember it.

To say the story emerging from Canada’s west is disturbing does not come near close enough to the truth. It is a story that chills you to your core. Already, opinions are coming in from far and wide. Some are critical of the other bus passengers, who did nothing to try and prevent the tragedy. Others are critical of the apparent lack of security on buses. Everyone is entitled to their own opinion. Here’s mine.

Don’t sit back and criticize what other people did or did not do on that bus, because you weren’t there. You have no idea how you would react. I’d like to think I could do something heroic but the truth is that witnessing a scene like that would probably freeze me in place. If not, survival instincts could take over and I may well run like hell. And let’s not make this an issue about bus safety, or security at Greyhound terminals. This horrific act was so random in nature that it could literally have happened anywhere, including on any given morning at your favourite coffee shop in Anyplace, Canada.

A young man’s life has been snuffed out by a senseless tragedy. It is natural for our personal feelings of safety and security to be shaken. I can’t help but think mental illness played a role here. Let’s hope others find the help they need before we are forced to bear witness to such a crime again.

I can’t count the number of interviews I’ve heard over the years where the subject acknowledged her or his family as the reason for their success if not their entire reason for being. You can have the best job in the world but, when it comes right down to it, more and more of us seem aware that it’s the people back home that matter the most. The older I get, the better I understand this.

I have a close-knit family and I’m a happier person for it. Last night, without a major holiday or anniversary to mark, my family got together for an impromptu gathering. We were celebrating the occasion of my cousin’s graduation from the Randolph Academy for the Performing Arts. What a terrific way to spend a few hours on a mid-summer’s night. And way to go Jessica! You’ve done us all so very proud.

If there is a worse road to travel in this part of the province, I’m yet to find it. If you’re not trying to steer clear of distracted drivers and street racers, you’re dodging potholes or sitting in traffic caused by crashes or construction. There was a day that the 401 quite ably got you from Waterloo Region to Toronto. Those days are long gone. I understand that, at one time or another, road work has to be done. But it seems to me that there is just no good time to close down even a single lane on the already overcrowded highway. But all three?

I had a very enjoyable evening at the ballpark last night. A good friend of mine and I got together with our Dads to enjoy a Jays game and some good conversation. We were headed home from Toronto around 10:15 and as we approached Guelph Line around 11 PM, we came to a dead stop. No warning, no signage, just a dead stop. Two hours later we were at Highway 6 South and using the left shoulder to squeeze past construction. All three lanes of the highway had been closed without so much as  a sign telling us what lay ahead. Are you kidding me? In my opinion, a detour was the least that could have been set up. Truckers were pulling off to the side of the road to call it a night while the rest of us, presumably with places to go or people to see, simply wasted two hours sitting on the highway.

If this is an example of “moving our economy forward” as some highway construction signs would have us believe, we are headed in the wrong direction in a hurry.

I have to admit to getting a little excited and feeling a small flush of pride whenever I hear our region mentioned by someone outside our region. Such was the case last week when the federal and provincial governments announced a combined six billion dollars in infrastructure funding — and singled out Waterloo Region and our rapid transit initiative — as one of the priorities for that funding. What rapid transit system, you ask? You’re not the only one with the question.

It was a little more than four years ago, and with much pomp and circumstance, that the project was first revealed to the public during a news conference at the Grand River Transit terminal on Charles Street in Kitchener. The first phase, we were told, would involve an environmental assessment. Four years hence, we still await the completion of that assessment. But that hasn’t stopped politicians from posturing and using this project as a means of suggesting they’re doing something for the environment and that the future of this region is very green indeed. My question is, how distant a future are we talking about?

If in four years all we can muster is an environmental assessment, how long will it take us to actually build a functional system? At this point, we are still trying to decide between rapid trains and buses as our future transit options. But it is no secret that trains are the preferred choice for many. Which is all well and good, but what about the tracks? If the first stage of this transit system will connect north Waterloo to south Cambridge, how long does it take to get the infrastructure for a rail system like that ready for use?

Regional chair Ken Seiling says if everything checks out with the environmental assessment, we could see construction ready to begin by 2012. That’s another four years from now and eight years after the project was first announced. It’s also assuming Chair Seiling’s projections are accurate, but we’ll give him the benefit of the doubt. And for eight years’ work we will have a study, a decision on trains or buses and, presumably, a route. If that’s what we have to show for eight years, is it fair to extrapolate another eight at least to get the first phase of construction finished? If you find that unfair, consider Highway 7 from Kitchener to Guelph. We’ve been promised a new road connecting these cities for almost 15 years and after assessments and route plans, we’re told the new link is at least eight more years away. Using the same math, we’re looking at 2025 at the earliest before the first stage of Waterloo Region’s rapid transit is ready for its first passenger.

I guess what I’m saying is that I hope my kids enjoy Waterloo Region’s new rapid transit system because if it’s one thing that seems evident so far, it’s that there’s not very much rapid about it at all.

I pulled into the parking lot of the Tim Horton’s at Weber and Bridgeport in Waterloo on Friday night. From a distance, it appeared as though there was a person hunched over on the ground outside the entrance. But considering it was late and there was little light I just assumed my eyes were playing tricks on me. They weren’t.

As I got out of my car, I realized my sight had not betrayed me. There was a person, on all fours, on the ground outside the door. A medium-sized black dog was curled up next to him. As unusual as the sight was, what struck me as even more odd was what the man was doing. He had, spread out in front of him on the sidewalk, a series of architectural drawings. I recognized a front elevation of a house, and the “architect” had his rulers and slides in an array in front of him. Why he chose to make this his working space I’m not entirely sure. And though I’m certainly no expert, the drawings looked pretty good from where I was standing.

I guess when someone launches “Canadian Idol: The Architect’s Edition,” I know where they can begin their search for talent.