It's a Deal
Bedford Row, downtown Halifax
Looks like Metro Transit goers are in luck tomorrow morning. Buses and ferries are sticking to the routes and the strike has been averted.
Labels: Halifax, Metro Transit
Monday, October 01, 2007
Bedford Row, downtown Halifax
Looks like Metro Transit goers are in luck tomorrow morning. Buses and ferries are sticking to the routes and the strike has been averted.
Friday, September 28, 2007
Bus or bust?
It looks like we're on the verge of another bus strike come Monday morning. As much as the cynical enviro nuts would have you believe otherwise, there are many people who rely on buses for transportation - our graphic designers for examples. It looks like I'll be running a car pool on Monday and for potentially a long time thereafter. One speaker on the radio suggested the strike could run from two to ten weeks as Metro Transit is in the red and saving a weeks of drivers' salaries would put them back in the black. Seems logical to me, sadly.
Labels: Halifax, Metro Transit
Monday, November 20, 2006
Where there's smoke there's fines
Gossiping gulls at Peggy's Cove
I can't verify this at all but it was all the talk at work today, and some of my coworkers claimed it was a topic on the local talk radio station also. Rumour has it that, inspired by recent anti-smoking legislation up for consideration in California, our local council received a proposal today for a drastic smoking ban for Halifax. There's already a new smoking ban that goes into effect on December 1 that will ban smoking in any indoor public place as well as on terraces and patios of restaurants. Currently, such patios are alright and bars are permitted to include a smoking room provided it only takes up a certain percentage. This new proposal however, will extend a ban on smoking to include the entirety of the outdoors, including your own automobile, and also prohibits smoking in any multi-person dwelling. That means that if you rent an apartment, own a condo, or even live in a duplex, you'll be expected to butt out or risk a fine of as much as $500 bucks. To smoke, you will have to be the owner of a single-family dwelling. Welcome back, Feudalism. We missed you.
As if the government doesn't take in enough money in this country. Cigarettes are just under $10 a pack now, and 80% of that is taxes. Add it to all the crazy hopped-up fines that go through also. The booster seat law is a good example. For a piece of safety equipment that is still not entirely proven effective, you'll be looking at hundreds of dollars in fines if you are caught transporting a child without one, should the child be under nine years of age, or 4'9" in height. That's a pretty big kid to be riding in a booster seat. I'm surprised that they don't mandate helmets too.
The government, and law enforcement, seem intent on manufacturing new ways to create violators without doing anything substantive to go after violent offenders in our community. It's hard to stomach all these laws/veiled tax-grabs when you can't find a cop on a Saturday night in the city. There sure were plenty of cops around when Sunday shopping prohibition was in place, to make sure stores didn't exceed the loopholes in the law.
I've had one experience with a cop since moving back. It was actually the bridge police, if you want to consider them cops. I was driving 70 in a 70 kmph zone across the MacKay bridge, and reduced speed to 50kmph before hitting the 50 zone along the funnel. I wasn't speeding but the old goat tapped his siren anyway and warned me to slow down. The next day, I noticed that they moved the 50-zone further up the bridge. You now have to reduce your speed about a 100 feet before the funnel. I guess he jumped the gun after getting the memo. Either that, or he expected me to be clairvoyant and attentive to the street laws of the future. Boy, that'd be quite a talent.
For completeness, and largely for the benefit of the international readers, we sad and downtrodden Canadians also pay about 36% income tax and a Harmonized Sales Tax (HST) in the Maritimes of 14%. That works out to over 50% of every dollar I earn ending up in government coffers, not including Canada Pension Plan and Employment Insurance deductions. The HST was reduced by 1% this years as part of the Conservative party's election platform promises. Bad news to all you tourists, however; they just got rid of the HST/GST reimbursement. Once upon a time, tourists could save their receipts when visiting Canada and then file a claim to have the value of the HST/GST returned to them when they returned home. That tax break is now dead. Welcome to Canada. Enjoy your fiscal sodamizing.
Don't get me started on the raise in registration rates. ATV owners in Nova Scotia got a shock when their provincial licensing and registration fee quintupled this year with no reason given, and they've come under increased attention by law enforcement as well. And then there's the gun registry which the Torys have yet to kill...
Again, I just don't know what to expect in the future. This is tax rate now, but what will happen when baby boomers all retire and instead of contributing their much higher salaries to the tax base, they turn the tables and start sucking it out in geriatric health care costs? Government spending will have to go up, but there are fewer and fewer people entering the workforce, at lower relative salaries than ever before. How much longer before Ottawa starts accepting kidneys and newborn children come tax season in April?
If I could afford a crate of tea, I'd throw it in the harbour.
Labels: crime, Metro Transit, Nova Scotia, police, vice
Friday, July 28, 2006
Caption on the Bridge
The Halifax Harbour Hopper, an amphibious tour vehicle.
There was some firm talk this week from the Halifax-Dartmouth Bridge Commission on the future of crossing the harbour. They're about to begin what could be a ten-year study into the feasibility of a third link between Halifax and Dartmouth, communities currently served by the Angus L. MacDonald and A. Murray MacKay bridges and the Harbour Ferry. It's not the first time something like this has been rumoured -- a high-speed ferry [click for pdf] has also been proposed to link Bedford with Halifax -- but this report indicates a timeframe within which the link concept will be actively put under the microscope. A major issue will be whether to construct a new bridge or even possibly a tunnel. Discussions are set to begin this fall.
In the meantime, they're also looking at phasing out tokens by 2008 to encourage folks to sign up for the Macpass. Perhaps then we'll be able to trade unused tokens in for Salty dollars.
Labels: Halifax, Metro Transit
