Monthly Archives: October 2011

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Great Parry Sound Coverage – www.DailyXY.com

29 Saturday Oct 2011

Posted by in Parry Sound, Sights

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I just realized today in reviewing the Parry Sound Council meeting package for November 1, 2011, that Explorers’ Edge, the regional tourism body, had arranged for a writer to come up to Parry Sound for a visit.

It’s great coverage of the town and what it has to offer. You can find the three installments of the article at:

Part 1: http://www.dailyxy.com/article/fall-colour-in-cottage-country-north/
Part 2: http://www.dailyxy.com/article/fall-colour-in-cottage-country-north-part-ii/
Part 3: http://www.dailyxy.com/article/fall-colour-in-cottage-country-north-part-iii/

Enough said. If you enjoy the articles be sure to “Like” the articles. That will bump them up a little more in the search engines.

Kudos to Explorers’ Edge for making this happen. You can get more information about Explorers’ Edge at http://explorersedge.ca/.

TOPS Council Agenda Preview – 2011-11-01

28 Friday Oct 2011

Posted by in Events/Activities, Parry Sound, Town Council

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This is a short preview of the more interesting topics to be addressed at the upcoming Parry Sound Council meeting to be held November 1, 2011, 7:00 PM at the Town Hall, 52 Seguin Street. The full Tuesday agenda is available at the Town of Parry Sound’s (TOPS) website or through this link. More information on the meeting, along with background materials as provided to the Council members, is available at the Parry Sound Library and the Town Hall, Friday afternoons prior to the scheduled meeting. Note that the library is closed Sundays and Mondays.

Suggestions for those wishing to participate at the meeting are provided at the end of this post.

Key Agenda Items

9.2.1 and 9.2.2 – Quotation and tenders for road work and maintenance in TOPS.
10.2.1 – Execution of an agreement with CN for automatic gates at the Cascade St. crossing.
10.4.1 – a By-law to authorize the construction of the dog pound.

This is a relatively light agenda and there appears to be nothing controversial.

Suggestions for attending Council meetings and letting your voice be heard.

1. The meeting starts at 7:00 sharp. You don’t need to attend the full meeting. There are no breaks, but people regularly slip out of the meeting after their subject of interest is discussed.
2. If you want to present your point of view on any subject there is an opportunity to present a deputation at the start of the meeting. Mayor McGarvey asks the public if they wish to make a deputation at that time. This is the only opportunity at the meeting to express your opinion, even for a topic that is to be discussed later. There is no opportunity to express an opinion once the deputation portion of the meeting passes. There is also no intermission, or recess, where you can speak to a Council member. If you want to discuss something, or express your opinion, you need to do it at the beginning of the meeting.
3. You may also present your position on any town related issue even if it is not on the Council’s agenda. To do this you need to schedule your presentation at least a week before the next Council meeting so that it can be included in the agenda and Council members have an opportunity to review any materials you will be presenting. The person to contact about your presentation is Ms. Jackie Boggs, Deputy Clerk, EA to the CAO and Deputy Treasurer. She can be reach at the town office, 705/746-2101. Shorter, more informal presentations can usually be made as part of the Deputations portion of the meeting.
4. Town Council meetings are pleasant and informal, with the understanding that the audience can only provide their input prior to the meeting, or during the Deputations portion of the meeting.
5. Council meetings are a good opportunity to meet and speak with the Parry Sound local media. The North Star and Moose-FM are always present and happy to speak with those attending the meeting.

I hope this helps. See you at the next meeting.

Recent Power Outages – What Happened?

23 Sunday Oct 2011

Posted by in Parry Sound, Suggestions

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If you lived in the Louisa Street area you were conscious of three separate power outages last weekend (October 15th & 16th) and again on Monday. The first two outages on Saturday and Sunday evening each lasted between one and two hours. An then on Monday afternoon there was an outage that lasted less than a half hour.

When I called on Monday morning to ask about the weekend outages the answering machine picked up and said they were closed on Mondays. And a visit to http://www.pspower.ca provided no indication that there had been anything wrong or what they were planning on doing to avoid a repeat of the outage.

It was only after speaking with one of the Town Councillors, who was open for business on Monday, that I received a partial answer. Apparently trees had blown over and knocked out the power line serving the Louisa Street area. That’s not really a surprise given the high winds we had over the weekend. But one might think that PS Power would have anticipated something like this as part of their regular maintenance program. And with two prolonged outages on two separate days, it is clear there was a problem waiting to happen.

A couple of suggestions:

1. How about an ‘after the outage’ note on the website letting people know what happened and is being done to prevent a recurrence?

2. Information is important during an outage. Can PS Power provide a Tweet or post an update on their website letting people know when the problem is expected to be resolved. Yes, I can hear people wondering how people experiencing a power failure might get an online message. Well, there are a number of people who have smartphones, not dependent on the power grid, who could get the update and pass it on to their neighbors.

PS Power has done a great job providing Parry Sound with uninterrupted electricity, and the recent outage was a real surprise. But the exception often provides an opportunity for improvement. Being plugged into the web and social media can be a low cost, high leverage way to keep customers informed and comforted. And I’d love to know if PS Power has plans to prevent similar outages in the future, or will they simply fix problems as they come up. In the short term this can be a cheaper way to run a business, in the long run it’s not a great way to keep customers. But if you have a monopoly you really don’t need to worry about customers do you?

Forest Street Train Crossing

20 Thursday Oct 2011

Posted by in Green Shoots, Train

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As many of you have noticed there are crossing gates being installed at the Forest Street rail crossing. As of October 19th the gate mechanism seems to have been installed with the gate arms still to come. I hope it will be operational by the end of the month, but I’m not aware of a schedule.

Thanks are due Peter Brown, Director of Public Works for the Town of Parry Sound, and Councillor Paul Borneman for making this happen. The crossing was originally scheduled for installation in 2010 but was pushed back. Without the efforts of Messrs Borneman and Brown it might have slipped to 2012.

Here’s hoping that we look forward to the installations of gates at the Cascade Street crossing in 2012. As you remember this was the site of a train related fatality earlier this year. The Cascade crossing has a very obstructed view and creating one more barrier to ‘taking a chance’ can only help someone make the right decision and save their life.

People can always go around a gate at a railway crossing, but it takes time and it’s not easy. Like the RIDE program for reducing drunk driving, the crossing gates cannot prevent people from making a stupid decision, it can only make them think twice about the consequences.

Parry Sounds, October Beginnings

16 Sunday Oct 2011

Posted by in Parry Sound

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No the name isn’t a misprint. This is Parry Sounds as in Parry Sound – Sounds and Sights. The idea of this blog is to provide Parry Sound residents and visitors with information about out town that isn’t always available through other information sources.

The intent of this site/blog is to be upbeat and positive. That’s the way things get better; recognizing and nurturing the green shoots of concern and opportunity.

A theme you will see developed here is Parry Sound’s relationship with the trains that run through it. The trains are part of Parry Sound’s past, present and future. Let’s see how we can make the future the best it can be.

This site is committed to providing information on town events that aren’t always easily found. Too often I find out a day or two later about an event in town that I would have liked to attend. Let’s see if we can’t people informed of events that are of interest to them, especially those that aren’t advertised in the local newspaper. Let me know if there is something I have missed that you think people should know about.

Let me know if you have suggestions or want to contribute. Many hands make work light.

This is the start and I’m hopeful that the site will be fully up-to-speed by the beginning of the new year.