pointing out the obvious

Premier Dalton McGuinty announced the MoveOntario 2020 plan last week.  You can find the real details of this plan outlined by Steve Munro here.  It’s an ambitious plan, but a great move for southwestern ontario.  I still can’t believe the announcement, and really hope it happens.

This is a great move to reduce congestion on our highways, take a stab at pollution and help our cities grow.  While it’ll take time to implement, and it will take time to get people out of the ‘car’ mindset, it’s a great start.  If this happens, this is going to be a historic period in toronto’s transit history.

completely awesome.

I happened to run across the von drats playing on queen st east the other night and stayed for the remainder of their set. Their music was light and happy… surfer pop (or whatever you call it) is always awesome. For a peek, checkout the videos on their site.

While driving up Hwy 10 through Shelburne last weekend, I was pleasantly surprised to find myself in the middle of a wind farm. If you have ever driven through or past a wind farm, you understand that it can be an awe inspiring experience. This setup was the Melancthon Wind Plant by Canadian Hydro, which boasted 45 turbines and was completed in March 2006. It’s nice to actually see a plant at work in Ontario.

I’ve had the opportunity to drive through the wind plants in California, they are an experience to say the least. If you ever get a chance, you have to see them in person to understand. There must have been thousands of turbines setup on the mountains, all turning in the wind - somewhat hypnotizing. It was akin to my Newfoundland experience - when the ferry pulled in to Port aux Basques NF from Sydney NS and you first saw the terrain, you felt as if you had landed on another planet. Unbelievable.

Before anyone comments on the fact that I’ve done a few roadtrips, remember that driving is more responsible than flying. I also have a fairly economical car with a 1.8L engine, that gets 600km per tank in the city without hypermiling. I posted some 700+km tanks during my roadtrip before even knowing what hypermiling was. If I did the same trips now, I’m sure I would post 800km tanks.

While poking around on linkedin’s “who looked at your profile” feature today, I stumbled upon a colleague who now works at PlanetEye.  Interesting name, so I tried the domain and it’s locked down.  I googled it and figure out the company is working towards capitalizing on digital cameras equipped with GPS - which no doubt will become standard hardware at some point.  I think there is great opportunity in this space, I posted something about the idea a little while ago on the old blog and would love to see someone take full advantage of it.

Aside from the obvious privacy concerns, imagine all digital photos geo-tagged.  Pretty neat.  But imagine it one step further, where digital images are not only geo-tagged, but tagged with directional information - i.e. inclination and right ascension (never thought I would use those terms again!).  So you know where the photo was taken AND the angle the camera was at the time it was shot.  Imagine a database of images coupled with this information and little luck…  You might be able to render 3D images of almost anything, bring mapping to a whole new level, maybe apply the maps to games, who knows…

I’m glad someone is taking advantage.  I can’t wait to see what they come up with.

I have successfully rented, driven and returned a ZipCar twice, from two different locations and here’s what I thought…

The reservation process is pretty slick online - easy, intuitive, quick. I managed to rent with about 30 minutes notice without a problem, then rented a few days in advance without a problem. Awesome.

Searching for cars was a little buggy - if you select or unselect ’show me cars that are unavailable’ it doesn’t behave the way you would think. Someone needs to look at that, it’s not consistent. In my case, I wanted to find out when a truck was available, so not being able to see all trucks in the area that were booked or not booked was a little frustrating. But I figured out a way to make it work.

The cars are great. I rented a pickup on both occasions, so I expected it to be a little messy. However, the truck was relatively clean, a few scratches here and there, but it’s meant for moving things, so I was not surprised.

Upon returning a truck on Saturday morning to the Church and Wood St location, I found myself without my ZipCard. I likely lost it at the hardware store loading lumber and cement into the back. So this presented an interesting situation - I wasn’t able to lock the truck to complete my reservation at the lot.

Luckily, it was booked immediately after my drop-off time, so the other ZipCar member was there, ready to drive it away. I asked for the ZipCar number, and promptly called to remedy the situation. However, in order to get through the automated system and speak to a living person, I needed my ZipCard number. But I lost it, so I didn’t have it. I tried the normal ‘0′, or ‘*’ to get a living person, but it kept me away. It was very frustrating.

Eventually, I got the member waiting for the truck to call for me. Thankfully, she spoke to a ZipCar rep and cleared up the situation. But, if she had not been there, I would have been screwed.

Ultimately, the experience was a positive one. Having a truck available is EXTREMELY handy. AutoShare only seems to offer vans, which would have worked, but hauling bags of cement or lumber would have made a mess. With the pickup, I just swept the back out after my reservation and it was ready to return.

I’m hoping I find my ZipCard some day.  I’d like to rent again, it was a positive experience.  If I don’t find it, I’ll have to suck it up and pay $15 to have one reissued.

Incandescent bulbs are on their way out - in Canada and Australia anyways. Fluorescent are the new cool way to make a difference. HomeDepot, Rona, Canadian Tire, Home Hardware and others now have so many bulbs to select from that you could lose an hour trying to find a ’standard’ bulb.

I like fluorescent bulbs, don’t notice any flicker or difference in colour. However, the mercury thing has always bothered me a little. I know it’s better than incandescent, but now everyone has a little piece of mercury in their homes. What is the likelihood of those people recycling the mercury? For those who aren’t aware, you drop them off at one of the local drop-off depots, or environment day.

Why aren’t LED lights more popular? Why didn’t they catch on? They seem to exist for cars, flashlights, outdoor lights, and other applications - but not household bulbs? I suppose they haven’t tackled the directional light problems yet, but you figure someone would be working on that.

Until ‘depot, crappy tire, rona, home hardware start carrying LEDs to the masses, we can watch and hope that EcoLEDs make some quick progress and become more affordable. Apparently they last about 20 years, have no toxic components and use less power.

I’ve got my fingers crossed.