Editorial
How Did We Get Here?
BY SHANE WENZEL
Some days it feels like our country cannot survive if the Trudeau Liberals are in control for another four years, and even six more months may be too long.
Trudeau’s approval rating worldwide has shrunken to embarrassing levels abroad, and at home he appears to be attracting protesters at every stop. One of his latest insults to Canada is changing the way eager new Canadians take their oath to become Canadian, which many have described as one of their proudest moments. Posing for pictures holding little Canadian flags with other new Canadians to send ‘back home’ is optional. Just apply online. Not to mention, he changed some words in the National Anthem for the second time.
How much longer under his watch before there is no Anthem, or even ‘little flags and pictures’? Lecturing other world leaders on what he considers their flawed policies hasn’t helped his popularity worldwide either.
Joining in all of these surprising Canadian antics are some new local ideas resulting from a multiple-year study.
The idea of 15-minute cities has evolved where every new community resident will be able to live, work, shop, dine out and ‘’pubit’ in its own compact setting. Residents could potentially live their lives without venturing outside their community.
It sounds like you could possibly live through generations inside your designated ‘turf’. Biking, walking or transit would be the preferred transportation. The latest shocker out of this lengthy study we hear is the possibility that new and redesigned old developments could not include single family homes. Highrises and attached housing would work just fine. Now, that ‘middle of the night idea’ has already been met with strong opposition.
So, let’s hope that idea is going nowhere in the best-rated city in Canada to live according to 2022 world standards.
Don’t we have one of the largest uninhabited land masses in the world? Let’s hope that idea never gets past first mention. Maybe the ‘powers that be’ will be satisfied with just building the most expensive and potentially problematic expensive ‘Green Line’ in Canada.
Affordable/subsidized housing is next on the list, and the most perplexing to solve it seems. So far, spending millions of dollars repurposing unused downtown office towers into living complexes on the most expensive land in the city is underway. People in the building industry with more expertise are shaking their heads in dismay as the costs for renovation skyrocket.
But then if you don’t have a controlled budget what does it matter? Blowing down old buildings to start anew is noisy. However, we aren’t alone in silly times, just look around Canada at other so-called ‘innovative ideas’. Toronto is talking about banning two-engine leaf blowers, snow blowers and other small engine equipment under the guise of ‘Climate Action’.
Again, to accommodate someone’s Impact Study on climate, air quality, health and noise. Leaf blowers alone are considered an ‘egregious extra assault’ on residents. Chainsaws for cutting trees, snow blowers, garden rototillers, among others, are on the extinction list. Get out your scissors, grandma’s hedge clippers and hoe if you are planning a garden or a respectable lawn. But that’s Toronto, and surely not in danger of coming to Calgary, right?