Clay and Wattles

Well, my GHG-free vacation is back on in a slightly modified form. My broken wrist and I are leaving by bus on Friday for Wood Buffalo National Park on the NWT-Alberta border near Fort Smith. I will be backpacking for nearly three weeks through a remote wilderness area which is home to the world’s largest free-roaming herd of bison and almost the entire world population of whooping cranes.

There’s no internet service in the backcountry, so I won’t be posting again until August 21st or so. Bye for now.

I have never had so many good ideas day after day as when I worked in the garden.

-John Erskine (via)

Bryan’s comment on my last bike rack review has prompted me to write about the bike racks at our grocery stores. Food is something we all need, so car-free people should be able to park at the supermarket. It is also nice if we can park a trailer when we pull one to carry home our purchases.

Let’s start with the large Extra Foods store on Range Lake Road. As pointed out by Bryan, these racks are next to useless because they are bolted too close to the wall to actually lock your bike. The rings are very thin and flimsy, and the racks are located a long way from the entrance for no obvious reason. On the plus side, the store has installed two racks instead of just one and chosen a design that wouldn’t be completely useless if installed correctly. They have also provided plenty of space around the rack for trailers.

Extra Foods downtown has new racks as a result of the recent renovation of the entrance area (sorry, no picture yet). These racks are a sort of right-angle triangle design which isn’t ideal, but could be worse. Plusses: lots of capacity (perhaps the greatest number of bike parking spots in town), right next to the door, protected from traffic but connected to the roadway. Minuses: poor design, not much room for trailers.

Finally, we come to the Co-op. There are several problems here. This style of rack has very limited capacity because you can only attach a U-locked bike at either end or sideways along the middle of the rack, allowing a maximum of four bikes to be locked up by imaginative cyclists. As you can see in the photo, another problem is that carts are often left near the doors and could easily damage bikes or at least get in the way of cyclists. The rack is not actually attached to anything, so I have often had to pull it out from the wall in order to create enough clearance to attach my bike. I should also note that the rack is old and rusty (apparently the only thing which wasn’t upgraded when they built the new store), which seems to suggest that the Co-op doesn’t care much for cyclists or their needs. On the positive side, the rack is right next to the doors and there is room for trailers. Another positive is that I expect the newly-formed Co-op environmental committee will be a good mechanism to improve the situation.

Burning natural gas or oil releases only half as much carbon dioxide (as coal), but unburnt gas is twenty-five times as potent a greenhouse gas as is CO2. Even a small leakage would neutralise the advantage of gas.

-James Lovelock, quoted in The Weather Makers by Tim Flannery

I may not be a “wee, sleeket, cowrin, tim’rous beastie” like the subject of “To A Mouse” by Robbie Burns, but my well-laid plans have certainly suffered a setback.

While on my kayaking trip this past weekend, I slipped on a rock and broke my wrist. It was a slow and laborious process paddling back home, but I eventually made it to the emergency room where the doctor put my arm in a cast and told me I definitely can’t go on the cycling trip I’ve been planning for these many months. The particular break I have can’t take any direct pressure on it, such as leaning on handlebars. I don’t mind having a broken wrist – it is merely the latest and one of the least debilitating among my lifetime of similar injuries – but I’m distraught over cancelling my cycling adventure.

On the aforementioned long paddle home, I considered what I would do if my injury was severe enough to prevent cycling, so I haven’t despaired completely (though I was pretty upset for a while). I can’t ride my bike, but the doctor confirms I can hike anyplace I want, even with a broken wrist. The NWT is rich in wilderness, but has only a very few, very short hiking trails. That means travelling somewhere else or walking on roads. I could bushwhack along a river perhaps, but that is bound to be very tough going in these parts. I am also holding on to one more thin strand of hope: a friend just told me that somebody in town may have a recumbent bike for sale. If I can track it down, if it is suitable for a long distance ride, and if I can actually manage it safely with a broken wrist, then maybe…

Update: The cruel fates decided to tempt me with the recumbent. I tracked it down (with some difficulty), called up the owner, got a ride to the other side of town to see it – turned out to be a recumbent exercise bike. Arrrgggggggggh!

My good friend and eco-deity France Benoit just sent me this great link to keep you busy over the weekend:

Deconstructing Dinner is a weekly radio program produced at Kootenay Co-op Radio in Nelson, British Columbia, Canada. The program discusses the impacts our food choices have on ourselves, our communities and the planet. Deconstructing Dinner is broadcast on seven radio stations and is available for download on the program’s web site or via a podcast feed.

http://www.globalpublicmedia.com/articles/722

Have fun!

I’ll be kayaking on Great Slave Lake until Monday night. More posts next week.

The NWT Legislative Assembly is a pretty green building in its way (also a pretty, green building). Unlike most Yellowknife architecture, the Legislature was constructed in harmony with the surrounding rocks, trees, and water rather than in opposition to it. The building is surrounded by boreal forest trees which were undisturbed during construction, giving visitors the feeling of being part of the land instead of being inside an alien spacecraft which has landed on it. I don’t know whether the building was constructed to high standards of energy efficiency, but it at least appears to benefit from passive solar heat during the spring and fall and cooling shade in the summer.

The Legislature is an inspiring and welcoming building, but the bike racks, sadly, could stand improvement. On the plus side, the racks are located conveniently next to the main entrance within sight of the security guard station in the Great Hall. Also, the building is connected to paved multi-use trails on both sides, so you can cycle right up to the doors. There is theoretically space for a dozen or so bikes, but this brings us to the problem. The style of rack which was installed is simply unusable. Like the rack at Canadian Tire, this type is little more than a bike stand designed to torture cyclists and bend tires. It is almost impossible to actually lock up a bike to this style of rack, so I can only assume, as usual, that the person who chose it was a non-cyclist (an anti-cyclist?). Very disappointing for the building that was built from the ground up to showcase the best materials and design that the north has to offer.

This past weekend I volunteered for Ecology North at Yellowknife’s biggest summer festival, Folk on the Rocks. This year, EN worked with the FOTR committee to make the festival more green. There are lots of potential environmental impacts from an event like this:

• Management of wastes (compost, paper plates, styrofoam, plastic cups, cans, bottles, programs, etc.)
• Pesticide spraying on the site
• Transportation of ticket buyers to and from the site
• Transportation of guest artists

EN has plans for all of these issues, but this year focussed on the problem of waste. Doug Ritchie acquired the use of a delivery trike from generous local business Workplace Plus. He and other volunteers tirelessly made the rounds of the huge FOTR site collecting recyclables and garbage. He also set up a compost bin for food waste and “reuse your program here” racks.

EN also had an information table organized by crack environmental educator Claire Singer. I helped out with the table, but I spent most of my time helping with Doug’s other brainchild, the dish lending/washing station (for lack of a better name). We had a stack of almost one hundred plates which we lent out to people for a $2 deposit. After plate-borrowers bought food from the vendors on site and ate it, they returned the plates for a refund. Then we washed the plates and gave them out again. We also allowed anyone to wash their own dishes at our dishwashing station.

We had all the plates loaned out several times, so I estimate we saved at least 500 disposable plates through our efforts (unfortunately, we didn’t have any way to keep track of the number of times each plate was borrowed). I have never heard so many compliments on an EN project – dishwashing was extremely popular and very few people refused to participate when asked. I had a great time!

I should also mention that the dishwater was heated and pumped with solar energy. We used biodegradable soap and hydrogen peroxide bleach (disposed of on-site in the outhouse sumphole), so the impact was minimal.

On the transportation front, the City offered a shuttle bus to the site and bike parking was provided. As you can see in the photo, lots of people used it and we’ll need twice as much space next year. The rack was made from a cable salvaged from the YK dump and located right next to the main gate for security. To offset all the airline flights for artists, Doug has mentioned plans to make the whole event carbon neutral next year.

All the volunteers at FOTR deserve credit for their efforts. Most of the EN contingent sacrificed many hours of beer garden time to save the earth and should be congratulated. Doug did a fantastic job and reached a huge number of people. We are very lucky to have such a dedicated and creative activist on our side!

My worms are breeding like rabbits (which is much better than vice versa). I have added lots of compost over the past few weeks and they seem to burn through it very quickly. This photo (taken by my friend Wayne Hamer) shows a clump of worms that was working on a pocket of compost I added a week ago (click the photo to see a larger version for the full effect). I think it will be time to empty the bottom layer and move it to the top soon. Looks like we are on track to be able to compost all our food wastes in the vermicomposter this winter.