Canadian Place Name Trivia

Some interesting Canadian place-name trivia. In all, we have a lot of pleasant places, but we’re not all that creative when it comes to lake names! (“hey – that lake looks pretty long, let’s call it Long Lake!”)

Source: http://geonames.nrcan.gc.ca/info/trivia_e.php

Most Common Place Names in Canada

Rank	Place name	#
1.	Mount Pleasant	16
2.	Centreville	15
2.	Lakeview	15
3.	Pleasant Valley	14
4.	Fairview	13
5.	Rosedale	11
6.	Salem	10
6.	Bellevue	10
6.	Springfield	10
6.	Glenwood	10
6.	Richmond	10
6.	Riverside	10
6.	Westmount	9
7.	Maple Grove	9
7.	Greenfield	9
7.	Victoria	9
7.	Sunset Beach	9
7.	Sunnyside	9
7.	Little Harbour	9

Most Common Feature Names in Canada

Rank	Place name	#
1.	Long Lake	203
2.	Mud Lake	182
3.	Long, Lac	164
4.	Long Pond	152
5.	Rond, Lac	145
6.	Green Island	132
7.	Long Point	125
8.	Big Island	120
9.	Narrows, The	118
10.	Truite, Lac à la	113
11.	Round Lake	109
12.	Otter Lake	108
13.	Black Rock	103
14.	Long Island	101
14.	Perdu, Lac	101
14.	Moose Lake	101
15.	Little Lake	100

Sandbagging effort in Fargo

This video captures 20 minutes of sandbagging at the Fargodome.

Evergreen Line

So Stephen Harper was in town recently, and was found giving a press-conference announcing that "The Rapid Transit (Sky Train) Line To Coquitlam will be built". Unfortunately Glen Clark promised the same thing in 1999 (check out this 1998 news release talking about a "Broadway-Lougheed-Coquitlam-New Westminster" sky train route. Hopefully this time we can trust the politicians.

Zimbabwe introduces $50 billion note

Zimbabwe's central bank will introduce a $50 billion note -- enough to buy just two loaves of bread -- as a way of fighting cash shortages amid spiraling inflation.

source: CNN

Comparing Obama and Bush's victory speeches

It's quite a stark comparison to compare Obama's Nov. 2008 presidential victory speech against George W. Bush's 2004 victory speech.

Bush in 2004:

(source: http://www.spike.com/video/bushs-victory-speech/2655088)

Obama in 2008 (note: YouTube playlist has 3 videos):

Palin's foreign credentials tested

In response to Palin's comments about her foreign policy experience based on being able to see Russia from Alaska, Michael Koswowsky has set up a special map using his "HeyWhatsThat" tools. Looks like there are only 4 very hard to reach spots where you can see Russia in Alaska.

the World Bank on "Intangible Wealth"

Two years ago the World Bank's environmental economics department set out to assess the relative contributions of various kinds of capital to economic development. Its study, "Where is the Wealth of Nations?: Measuring Capital for the 21st Century," began by defining natural capital as the sum of nonrenewable resources (including oil, natural gas, coal and mineral resources), cropland, pasture land, forested areas and protected areas. Produced, or built, capital is what many of us think of when we think of capital: the sum of machinery, equipment, and structures (including infrastructure) and urban land.
But once the value of all these are added up, the economists found something big was still missing: the vast majority of world's wealth! If one simply adds up the current value of a country's natural resources and produced, or built, capital, there's no way that can account for that country's level of income

Read the entire article here: http://www.reason.com/news/show/122854.html

Coup in Fiji

It appears that Fiji has been thrown back into the news again for the wrong reasons. The most recent military coup should put the country back another 20 years.

The current military coup appears to be mostly about the "Reconciliation, Tolerance, and Unity Bill":

The Reconciliation and Unity Commission is a proposed government body to be set up if the Reconciliation, Tolerance, and Unity Bill, which was introduced into the Fijian Parliament on May 4, 2005, is passed. The legislation proposes to empower the Commission to grant amnesty to perpetrators of the Fiji coup of 2000, and compensation to victims of it from 19 May 2000 through 15 March 2001. The Fijian President will retain a veto over the granting of amnesty.

Good Wikipedia articles about the proposed bill (all articles appear to have been written prior to the coup) :

• About the Bill
  
• Foreign Reaction
• Supporters of the bill
• Opponents of the bill

I hope that there isn't any violence in Fiji, and that (somehow) good governance can take hold.

Vancouver Gateway Project

This last week Gordon Campbell announced the long hinted at "Gateway Program" for the Greater Vancouver area. This program is a large scale highway improvement project which includes:

• Widen Highway 1 all the way from McGill (by the Second Narrows Bridge) to Langley. This includes twinning the Port Mann bridge from the current 5 lanes to 10 lanes.
• North Fraser Perimiter Road improvements, including replacing the Pitt River bridge, and upgrading the Mary Hill bypass.
• Adding a new South Fraser perimiter road.
  

For the provincial government's perspective on this project, there's this lovely video.

The GVRD has long had issues with this project, including the motion from Oct 1, 2004

“That the GVRD Board express its concerns with the province’s unilateral approach to regional transportation planning and urge the province to return to a regional transportation planning process that involves the collaboration of municipalities, the GVRD, the GVTA and the province.”

Two of the most telling questions asked by the GVRD to the province include:

• “Based on what evidence will twinning the Port Mann Bridge and widening the #1 freeway solve the congestion problem?”
• “How does this project fit with the priorities in TransLink’s Strategic Transportation Plan, the GVRD Livable Region Strategic Plan, the GVRD Sustainable Region Initiative, the Vancouver City Transportation Plan and the Vancouver Climate Change Action Plan?”

My take on all this is that the province is trying to go completely around the GVRD, Translink, and all the regional municipalities and push through their own agenda of "bigger is better". I think that the Livable Region Strategic Plan - which pushes for regional centers and less automobile use - is being completely trounced upon by the province.

Even the province acknowledges some of the problems associated with this "bigger is better" approach (but for some strange reason they still want to go through with it):

If the improved highway is not effectively managed through tolls and/or other congestion-reduction measures, analysis shows that it would reach current levels of congestion 5 to 10 years after project completion. Additionally, without these measures, the level of congestion in the corridor would make it difficult to offer improved transit services along the route.

Strangely enough, the province hasn't even appointed any board members to Translink (they are allowed 3) - wouldn't using Translink be a more appropriate way to bring this project forward?

The province is doing some public consultation. I know I will try to be at one or more of these:

• Feb 18 2006: Langley (10am-1pm @ Walnut Grove Community Centre)
• Feb 25 2006: New Westminister (10am-1pm @ Centennial Community Centre)
• March 4 2006: Burnaby (10am-1pm @ Eight Rinks)
• March 8 2006: Burnaby (6pm-9pm @ Bonsor Recreation Centre)
• March 25 2006: Vancouver (10am-1pm @ Hastings Community Centre)
• March 29 2006: Vancouver (6pm-9pm @ Roundhouse Community Centre)
• April 8 2006: Surrey (10am-1pm @ Guildford Recreation Centre)
• April 11 2006: Surrey (6pm-9pm @ North Surrey Arena)
• April 22 2006: Coquitlam (10:30am-1:30pm @ Coquitlam Library, Poirier Branch)
• April 25 2006: Coquitlam (6pm-9pm @ Planet Ice)
• April 29 2006: Abbotsford (11:30-2:30pm @ Abbotsford Recreation Centre)
  

2006 Port Moody Calendar

I just received a copy of the 2006 Port Moody calendar, and it looks absolutely stunning! I wish I could say that I had something to do with this mastepiece, but unfortunately I can not.

Awesome job Barb!

Port Moody RSS Feeds

We have just launched RSS Feeds for the City of Port Moody's website.

Let's see how people end up using these!

note: my blog uses a javascript conversion of this RSS for the sidebar.

Port Moody Blogs

There are several blogs that I have found pertaining to Port Moody:

• Port Moody Station Museum blog
• Tri-Cities Political Report (Onion Version)
  
• Tri-Cities Political Report

The political report (onion version) is particularily good.