Rehash of a Rehash

Anonymous has left a new comment on your post "A Little Hiustory":

"It's good for everyone to be aware toxic chemicals are still buried in creek beds. They never lose
toxicity. It's wise to ensure they should never be disturbed."

Also remember that toxic chemicals are found in snow removed from roads and parking lots. They contain salts and other chemicals. When the snow melts, it should be contained and not allowed to enter the ground water.

Posted by Anonymous to Our Town and Its Business at 23 July 2014 10:27
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The above  is the second  comment to point out the error of my ways in opposition to the million dollar  treatment  facility for melted snow.

$169,000  was spent on the design during the last term. Total price  at original conception was $750,000.

It was a capital construction item pending.

Snow was  being dumped in the gravel parking lot at the leash-free    dog park on Industrial Parkway north . Before that it was at the side of the railway where the community garden is now located. It had to be shifted when we sold the Jack Woods farmhouse property.

We need a snow dump for an average of  three months a year.

The  parking lot is permeable. When temperatures rise, the dumped snow melts into the grounds like everywhere else.

The proposal was  to pave the parking lot , construct  gutters  and channel  snow melt into a treatment facility  to remove salt and release treated water  into the  arboretum.

There was something not quite right  about it. I went to sleep  thinking about it. I wakened in the night  with a start  thinking;

Wait al minute...salt is soluble in water .It can't be removed .

Well ....the next explanation was "pathogens"  needed to be removed  from the snow melt. Salt was no longer held to be the problem.

O.K. So I'm not a chemist. What are pathogens ?

Animal excrement.

Animal excrement!!!! When was the last time  a dog  was seen squatting on  a snow bank on Yonge
Street.  No recollection comes to mind.

The next explanation was windshield washer from cars. It gets on the road and  gets plowed aside into the snow banks and has two be removed by treatment.

The  final offering  was the snow dump is in the well-head protection area. The aquifer must be protected.

Well,you know, by this time I am done  listening to explanations.  The treatment facility was deferred. But not removed from budget forecaste.

Back  it came, included in the  planned Joint Operation Centre. Now, it's a million dollars less the
$169,000 already spent on  the treatment facility design.  No longer identified  as a treatment facility. Now it's called snow storage facility.

Sly smiles around the table indicate appreciation of  sleight of hand in getting back with the program.

In my judgement, the project is a gigantic boondoggle. Part of  an. even more spectacular piece of feather-bedding.

A. snow  dump accommodates a fraction of the snow that falls in the municipality.

A bylaw requires dog-owners to stoop and scoop on penalty of a fine.

Where there  is salt  or windshield washer ,there can be no snow or ice.


It has been established salt is a soluble and except in Israelthere is no process to remove it from a solution.

In the second place where  there is  salt  or windshield washer there is neither ice nor snow.

No snow needing to be stored.

Snow is not collected from probably ninety-eight per cent of town highways and byways. It's left to melt where it sits. Apparently without concern. for toxic chemicals within.

Snow dumps have had to be moved regularly over the years.

If the permeable parking lot on Industry Street  North  is not the right place. Shift it.

Forget the cockamamie million dollar scheme to remove chemicals that can't be where they say they are.

If you have snow or ice,, you can't have salt and windshield washer fluid.

If you have salt and windshield washer fluid ,you can't have snow or ice.

You don't have two be a chemist or an environmentL engineer to figure that one out.

You do have to sbe fifty different kinds of a fool to allow yourself to believe it.