This month marks one whole year of operating Hand to Ground; our small-scale, regenerative, family farm business. And what a year it was for us – so many things done for the first time, research gathered, mistakes made, successes celebrated, relationships built. It was daunting to step out and make a go of farming full-time for a livelihood. We are told the first two to five years are the most difficult for a new business, and without the support and encouragement of friends and family, as well as mentoring through the Government's NEIS program – we likely wouldn't have kept going.
We started the year with two warré beehives in operation. We harvested our first batch of about 9 kilos of raw cold pressed honey in March.We sold all our strained honey, and rendered the beeswax for soap and candle making and cooking. Sadly after a very dry Autumn and cold Winter we found we had lost one of our hives, the other appeared slow and weak and the colony absconded before we had to chance to re-Queen! At the same time in the early Spring we gained four other colonies – two from abandoned hives on a friends' property, and two as wild swarms – one caught onto of our water tank and one caught in a friend's backyard. Despite a very short and hot Spring, all four hives are going well, though building their stores very slowly.
In February we welcomed 300 day-old layer chicks to our custom built wooden brooding houses. Once big enough, they moved into their beautiful "egg mobile" hen house built atop a caravan trailer – which provides shelter at night, a cool place to lay eggs in the day, and can easily be towed across the pasture. In June they began to lay eggs – about 180-210 each day – which we collect, clean and pack by hand. We began delivering our pastured eggs to cafes, restaurants and a green grocer in nearby towns. We added a further 50 point of lay hens in Spring, and encountered a great chicken faux pas – that you don't ever just join two flocks of hens together without giving them some time to get used to each other (with a barrier or some kind) – otherwise the pecking order is disturbed and you experience a swift drop in egg production! We acquired two roosters to help keep the peace, and slowly got back to normal production.
In Autumn we brooded our first batch of meat chickens. The 300 day-old broiler chicks actually arrived the afternoon of our baby boy Beren's birth! We learnt a lot in the weeks that followed about brooding broiler chickens, our local climate and how to keep our birds healthy and thriving despite extreme temperature fluctuations and prowling foxes! In late Winter we began brooding our next batch of meat chickens, ready for processing in late Spring and early Summer. We began suppling local cafes and restaurants with our tasty birds, as well as running a pre-order and pick-up system with our fabulous local green grocer Watts' Fresh in Kyneton. We also bought a refrigerated trailer – and with the meat safety inspector's tick of approval – were able to start transporting our chickens to our local farmers markets.
We attended a total of 12 farmers markets with Emily's gluten free baked goods and seasonal preserves. Her French-style baked custards "canéles" and sourdough bread were especially popular. She also ran her first gluten free bread making workshop in October – hosted by our dear friends at A Plot in Common – It was a great success and she will be holding another workshop in February.
Alex was fortunate enough to see the great farmer, writer and agricultural activist – Joel Salatin speak three times this year! He attended a Jonai Farm's Grow Your Ethics workshop, and was also part of a Deep Winter gathering of like-minded people to discuss the future of small scale sustainable and ethical agriculture and food sovereignty. We are optimistic that with continued public interest, political pressure and support from local communities – fair food and farming systems will continue to grow in Australia.
We are so thankful for the support from our local community – our families, new friends (and old), big-hearted neighbours, chefs and restauranteurs, grocers, mums and dads – who care about what they eat and where it comes from. We do feel enormously blessed that we are still in operation – that we have access to land and water and opportunity to share what we raise with those around us.
So we harvested our first honey about two months ago, I was heavily pregnant and just managed to zip up the bee suit. We followed David Heaf's notes on harvesting from Warré hives – making sure we were not going to rob our bees of their most precious winter honey stores. We only took frames that were almost entirely capped honey and only from our stronger hive colony (caught as a wild swarm in November last year). We used our smoker to extract the top-bar frames – we discovered to our frustration that some of the frames were fused to the box beneath – and had to cut them free. The bees were (rightly) unhappy with all the smoke and fumbling and disturbance. We did not really know what we were doing – let alone how to get the frames into a plastic tub and sealed without taking a lot of bees home with us, and worse without drowning or squashing them in the process! In the end we did get the frames packed for home, and oh were they beautiful… like pure gold when held up to catch the light.
p.s. a few jars of our raw honey are still for sale here.
Oh! So much has passed in the two months since our last blog post… we held three successful market stalls, harvested our first batch of raw cold-pressed honey (about 9 kilos worth), welcomed 300 day-old broiler chicks in to brood, moved our laying pullets out onto the pasture with their spiffy new mobile laying house, and not long afterwards moved the broiler chicks into their newly constructed pens on the grass, processed our first batch of deliciously plump pastured chicken, oh and had ourselves a beautiful baby boy – Beren Argyle – who is now six-weeks-old!
It's been a truly busy Autumn and at times hard to keep up with all that needs attending to.
Last week we welcomed our second swarm into it's new Warré hive and so far the bees seem smitten with their new home among the flowering yellow box trees. We also did our first open inspection of our older hive – mostly to nadir a third box – but also to inspect the general wellbeing of the hive and look out of for pests (of which we found no sign). We were overjoyed to find the top box completely full of honey stores and the second almost full – so thankful we added a box when we did in case the bees should out of room and looked to swarm elsewhere! We plan to do a small harvest in Autumn, making sure there is plenty of honey stores for the bees to winter on. A piece of heavy honey-ladden honeycomb fell off as we were lifting the top box, I quickly bagged it and later at home we delighted in the sweetness and pale golden colour of our first raw honey. The hint of yellow-box flowers was unmistakable. What clever, glorious creatures bees are….
Can there be a more delightful sight than a swarm of bees hanging from a suburban clothes line? Perhaps only the sight of your newly-captured swarm making a happy home in a handmade hive. Alex and I agree we could watch the bees fly in and out of the hive entrance all day long, and imagine what they are doing, discussing and debating inside its walls.
Yesterday I accompanied local beekeeping (and swarm-removing) enthusiast, Rei, in the safe recovery of a swarm that was hanging from a lady's washing line – on her brand-new blue sweatpants no less. Rei showed me how to assemble a simple cardboard box with a frame of pure wax foundation inside to contain the swarm as it's moved to another location. We rested the box on a garbage bin beneath the swarm and proceeded to "shake" the swarm into the box. Swarming bees are at their most docile (least likely to sting you) and quite happy to accept a new home. We left them in the box with a couple of entrances for the rest of the swarm to fly in. Then at sunset Alex and I returned to secure the box and drive back to the farm where our Warré hives are set up and ready. We used smoke to coax the last of the bees inside the box and taped all the entrances up (with plenty of breathing holes) before driving our with our boot-y of bees!
It was dark when we arrived at the hives. We worked in car headlights more clumsily than we would of liked – opening and tipping the cardboard bee box on the top of our hive using a spare comb box as a funnel for the bees to crawl down between the frames. In hindsight we should have prepared our smoker, and in a panic I got stung about five times on the hands because I was wearing gardening gloves instead of my leather ones and the bees were agitated at being shaken out into darkness. I haven't been stung since I was a child and it was painful – like an intense swipe from a stinging nettle. Thankfully we got the stressed bees into the hive quickly and covered them overnight with a cotton cloth.
We are so nearly finished with our first two natural bee hives – modelled on Emile Warré's People's Hive– a hive quite different from the conventional Langstroth and designed specifically to support the health and happiness of bees, while also being low maintenance for the keepers. The main differences are in the deep, square hive boxes and the use of top bars instead of pre-fabricated beeswax comb set in frames – the top bars allow the bees to build their own natural comb but have sides so the bees are guided away from the sides of the box (and can be removed without much effort). As the bees build comb downwards, additional boxes are placed below – the Queen and brood is not excluded from the rest of the hive. On the top of the hive sits a quilt box with a bag filled with wood shavings or pure wool to absorb moisture and help with the regulation of temperature (something which is exceedingly important to the bees) – then on top of that is a gabled roof to allow for increased ventilation – and in cold parts of the world act as a sloped roof to keep snow off. We used David Heaf's "Natural Beekeping For All" for step-by-step instructions on how to construct each component.
We sourced our wood from a local timberman who milled cypress logs into planks. Alex then cut and assembled the boxes, quilt boxes and roofs using Tim Malfroy's conversions for the Warré hive. We ordered top bars and two beetle repelling bottom boards. The outsides of the hives have been brushed with raw linseed oil – the inside we'd like to rub with a little pure beeswax. For the quilt box I sewed two square hessian bags which we filled with our cypress wood shavings. Now we just need to finish assembling the frames and find ourselves some honey bees! We recently joined a local club "the Woodend bee friendly society" and look forward to getting to know other enthusiasts, and assisting with some swarm catching as soon as they become available!
We also went to our first beekeeping field day put on by the Victorian Apiarist Association in Bendigo. We watched the opening of some hives and perused stalls of equipment and bee-related paraphernalia. We bought a stainless steel smoker, hive tool and emlock straps – plus a couple of sheets of pure beeswax foundation and honey from a local apiarist. It was sweltering hot and I felt a bit disappointed by it all – no stalls or talks relating to natural beekeeping or even native bees – instead that overwhelming focus on increasing production, honey yield, conventional methods of breeding/keeping/extracting, fear of colony collapse… Important to know of course, but not what interests me most about bees (or why we want to keep them).
I smiled, thanked him, and walked on… and thought to myself – I want our bees to trouble themselves with comb – I absolutely do.
Read more about about Warré hives here.
About a month ago we took Milkwood Permaculture's two-day course in natural beekeeping with master bee-keeper (warré hive extraordinare) Tim Malfroy. It was a wonderfully inspiring and informative course. We poured over information, facts, myth, statistics, building plans about bee keeping in a world that is so indebted to these mysterious winged creatures.
I came away with a desire not so much to "keep bees" as to learn alongside them. Tim took us on the second day to see a former student's thriving apiary in inner-city Sydney. We were led around her house to her back garden – to the apiary – nothing fancy or overstated there – behind a wooden screen fence were two stacks of squarish boxes painted in pastel hues. Drawing closer I could heart a faint buzzing and see a flutter of busy wings about their entrance. Tim walked us through the process of lighting a smoker with cypress pine needles. He then opened up the hives to show us the natural comb which the Warré hive system allow bees to build – he didn't wear any gloves or fancy gear – except a veil over his face. Bees don't want to string you, Tim explained to us, they are simply trying to protect their hives; their queen, brood and internal heat necessary for their survival. I can only remember being stung by a bee maybe once or twice when I was a child. Knowing why and how and when bees sting has helped me understand their nature – and actually appreciate it more. Since taking the course I have noticed how often bees are categorised as "angry" (ie. wanting to sting you) in children's books, cartoons, literature etc… How sad to reduce the nuances and wonderful work of bees to an emotion or a discomfort.


BS, Kaplan University, Davenport, IA.
"I'm not aware of any serious incidents, but that doesn't mean it never happens. We can, and should, take steps to make sure our police are trained in de-escalation rather than confrontation and use measures like body cameras to document encounters. I recognize that the state needs to have a swat team somewhere in NH to respond to serious incidents, but the increasing militarization of local police departments is inappropriate."
"I consider myself a moderate on gun issues, and legislation dealing with firearms and related topics often ends up being rather complex. I examine every gun bill we get, and my vote is often influenced by the 'minor details' in the legislation. Generally speaking I favor common sense policies such as universal background checks, restrictions on 'cop killer' ammo sales, and banning military heavy weapons from civilian ownership but I don't support things like 'wide net' gun confiscation. As a moderate on gun issues, neither 'side' usually likes me on this one."
"Workers in any career field have a right to collective bargaining as a means to secure equitable benefits and wages for themselves. This right does not cease if one is employed by the state or a municipality. Our teachers, fire fighters, police, and other civil servants are dedicated professionals who deserve a fair livable wage and decent benefits. Professions that serve the public good should be aspired to, and not looked down upon. I will strongly oppose any measures that aim to remove or restrict collective bargaining rights for anyone in New Hampshire."
"It doesn't seem right to go to the store and select an item marked for sale at a price of five dollars, bring it to the counter and be asked for five dollars and twenty cents. A sales tax would provide an unnecessarily large inconvenience to New Hampshire consumers, an incredible implementation burden for New Hampshire businesses, and increased administrative overhead in Concord. While I understand, and agree with, the need to maintain a solid revenue foundation for our state budget I do not feel that a broad based consumer sales tax is a practical or appropriate measure for New Hampshire."
"This question is too vague. We could stand to increase some forms of subsidies and tax credits, but not others."
"Not unless it was part of a package that SIGNIFICANTLY reduced/replaced our reliance on property taxes. I am opposed to an income tax on its own, though I would support expanding the existing interest & dividends tax to a more general capital gains tax."
"Not unless it was part of a package that SIGNIFICANTLY reduced/replaced our reliance on property taxes. I am opposed to a sales tax on its own."
"This question is too vague. 'statewide standards-based student assessments' isn't an all-or-nothing thing. Certainly it can provide valuable information and statistics to test our students occasionally, but we shouldn't tie the fate of a school district to those test results and we shouldn't be running these statewide tests multiple times per year or anything like that."
"Ever since the US Supreme Court ruled in Citizens United vs FEC, we have seen a torrential flood of anonymous money flow into our political system. This paradigm represents the potential for blatant corruption of the highest order, and gives unprecedented influence over our elections to a small number of individuals. This is completely antithetical to the basic principles our country was founded on. I support any measures possible, including calling for a Constitutional Convention to amend the US Constitution stipulating that corporations are not people as well as other well thought out campaign finance reform. Over the last few decades, our federal elections have been won by the candidate who raised the most money over 90% of the time. Running for office should be a call to service, not a contest of who can pander to monied interests."
"The question is too vague. We've always had some form of residency requirement in order to vote, and the requirements we had in place before the Republicans started to introduce voter suppression legislation during the 2011 session were functioning just fine. I support the principle that you should vote where you live (to include college students who live here, on campus) but I do not support any of these overly restrictive voter suppression laws being put forward in recent years."
"The NH GOP invented the issue of supposed 'voter fraud' completely out of thin air. During the 2004 election, there were over half a million ballots cast in New Hampshire. Out of that number, a grand total of four were even suspected of any kind of fraud – with only two being suspected of intentional fraud. This is a voter fraud rate of 0.0006%. The NH GOP has continually pushed measures to suppress voter turn out in NH among demographics that are more likely to vote for Democratic candidates including students and the elderly. Speaker O'Brien himself admitted that the "Voter ID" bills were aimed at intentionally disenfranchising potential Democratic voters. I strongly oppose such bills, and will work hard to restore voting rights to everyone in New Hampshire. Every vote counts!"
"Using state resources to enforce federal immigration laws is a 'slippery slope' situation that could lead to all manner of other requests from the federal government. I'm hesitant to start down that path."


Loreena McKennitt has released remastered versions of all of her albums plus a DVD. She also plans to release an album of new material in late 2005.
And now the bad news: Enya isn't releasing a new album, despite rumors to the contrary.


Between Thanksgiving and Christmas I think it's safe to say that we all overindulged a little bit! If you're feeling tired and sluggish and your pants are fitting more snug, what you need is a good detox! Chronic inflammation is the root cause of many chronic diseases, as well as general everyday aches and pains, skin problems, bloating, and fatigue.
My Curried Squash Soup is the perfect cleansing dish, made with only plant-based ingredients and is super warming to the body on cold winter nights, thanks to the ginger root! I made this for the first time the other night, and I knew after my first bite that I had to share it--it's seriously my new favorite recipe! If you aren't crazy about ginger, trust me, I wasn't either, but this soup is incredibly delicious! Best part--super quick and easy!
Ginger and turmeric have been used as spices and medicinal herbs for centuries in Indian and Asian cultures, and for good reason--both are anti-inflammatory roots that are fantastic at detoxification and healing.
Ginger is commonly used to aid in digestion, ease an upset stomach, reduce nausea and motion sickness, and is also useful for combatting the common cold due to its high level of antioxidants. It is also considered a warming food that may help to elevate the body's core temperature.
While ginger is very potent in flavor, turmeric is very potent in color--both lending to their distinctive presence in most dishes they're added to. Turmeric's bright yellow hue will take over almost any dish, and is due to a component known as curcumin. Like ginger, it is highly anti-inflammatory and contains potential anti-cancer compounds.
In a large pot, bring 4 cups of vegetable broth (or water) to a boil. Remove seeds and skin and chop the squash. Peel and cut the carrots and add to the pot on medium heat.
Meanwhile, add a splash of vegetable broth to a pan and sautee the onion and garlic on medium-low heat until translucent. Add in ginger, turmeric, and curry powder and stir for about 30 seconds, or until fragrant.
Add onion, garlic, and spices to the pot and continue to boil on medium-low until the squash and carrots are cooked through and tender.
Gear up and look your best to celebrate the New Year by detoxifying with this plant-powered dish. Not only will this soup cleanse your body, it will also keep you warm through the winter months! Leave a comment and let me know what kind of twist you put on the recipe, and have a very Happy New Year!
* Besides using ginger and turmeric in cooking, try adding one or both to your morning smoothie or juice for an added raw, anti-inflammatory, antioxidant boost!


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Home|Opinion|Letters|The vaccine-only approach is not working
The vaccine-only approach is not working
The Nassau Guardian Send an email October 15, 2021
There is an article on the front page in one of the daily newspapers this week with a headline that reads, "Former minister says change our policy or accept frequent deaths".
In the article, he states, "I see a dramatic disconnect between what is happening in the clinical arena and what the public's perception seems to be."
I agree and believe that the change of policy we need, which will result in more lives being saved and more people kept from being admitted to hospital, is for us as a country to adopt a three-pronged approach.
Along with the push to have people take the COVID-19 vaccine, we should also work on preventive medicines, then therapeutic medicines, if a person has gotten COVID-19, much like other countries are doing successfully.
I believe there is irrefutable scientific evidence for anybody who wants to look at the empirical data, that the vaccine-only approach will not get us out of this pandemic.
I refer to just two of many examples: Israel has one of the highest, if not the highest percentage of vaccinated people, yet their hospitals are full and many are dying, compared to Uttar Pradesh, India, which has declared that they are COVID-19-free by the government because they have also promoted preventive and therapeutic medicines to their population.
I am a Bahamian who had COVID-19, and have fully recovered by working closely with doctors and by implementing this approach.
I want to see more of my Bahamian brothers and sisters being survivors of COVID-19, and encourage our government to adopt this approach, so that we can do just that.
— Andy Knowles
Bahamas Olympic swimmer and coach
The Nassau Guardian
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16.31 mph

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaCommonCrawl


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import Profile from '../../components/profile/Profile';

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redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaGithub


Readers who follow me on Twitter will know that the question of which streetcar stops are being removed has been a simmering issue for some time. The question has become less "what is the list" than "why is it impossible to get the list".
A related matter is the degree of consultation, or not, that preceded implementation of the changes.
Several changes for The Beach (Queen Street East and Kingston Road) were announced in an email newsletter from Councillor McMahon, and the format of the list, complete with stop numbers, made it clear that this was a TTC document.
Courtesy of the fact that the TTC's own website contains out of date information about stop locations while the list in NextBus is current, it did not take long to track down the remaining changes, but the bizarre part of this is that repeated attempts to simply get a list from the TTC ran aground.
Eastbound stop at Fraser replaced by a new stop at the signal at Joe Shuster Way where there is already a westbound stop.
Westbound stop at Simcoe replaced by a new stop at the signal at St. Patrick. Now if only the TTC would put an eastbound stop there to replace the one they dropped in the last round at McCaul, and thereby break up the long gap from John to University.
Westbound stop at Beaconsfield shifted east a short distance to align with the new traffic signal at Abell St.
Eastbound stop at Wilson Park shifted west one block to Triller where there is a crosswalk and an existing westbound stop.
As a result of the restoration of streetcar service to Humber Loop, the stop at Parkside is back in service. This is reflected on NextBus but not on the TTC's own site.
Westbound stop at Crawford shifted one block to Shaw Street where there is a traffic signal and an existing eastbound stop.
Now that wasn't hard at all, was it?
2. refer the remaining stops identified in the staff report back to staff for further consultation with local Councillors and for report back to the next meeting.
The current round of changes includes several stops that were not part of the original list. When I pressed TTC management on what appeared to be a lack of notice of the change, not even bringing the scheme to the Board for approval, I was told that the 2014 motion was by an old Board and the staff were no longer bound by it.
Say what? Management can simply make up whatever policy they want when the Board is replaced in a new term of Council?
This is not a question of a nerdish railfan wanting to track the locations of stops, but of a much larger issue that will affect many parts of the City when the TTC turns it attention to bus routes. Some of the stop spacings on bus routes are embarrassingly short, and if the same principles are followed as for streetcars, a lot of buses won't stop as often, or as conveniently as they do today.
Many of the changes are quite reasonable and take into account the fact that there are now both crosswalks and traffic signals at locations where they did not exist when the transit stops were first installed. This type of change has less to do with new streetcars than simply reflecting the updated street design.
Another justification for elimination of stops in the 2014 round was that this would speed service. In fact, the effects were minimal because many stops that were dropped were not at traffic signals, and they did not represent much delay to streetcar service. This time around, most changes are relocations.
Memo to Councillors with bus routes: Pay attention to what the TTC is up to in your ward.
This entry was posted in Dundas Car, King Car, Queen Car, Service Cost and Quality. Bookmark the permalink.
I live near Queen / Woodfield and can confirm that area residents received a notice from the TTC that the Connaught and Kent / Woodward stops were to be removed several years ago before they started putting the sidewalk cuts in. I will attempt to find the document and post here if successful.
Steve: Thanks for confirming this. That would have been from the original 2014 report, and I'm not surprised that you received notice given the Board's motion at the time. The issue going forward is that such notice be given, including consultation, as the TTC moves to consolidate/restructure its bus stops.
Are not buses fundamentally different from streetcars in this sense since they stop only on demand (if someone presses the button or if there is a person on the stop)? Perhaps this is theoretically true for streetcars as well (is it?), but in practice due to demand streetcars stop at each stop (I don't ride streetcars that often, mostly subway and bus, but I've never been in a streetcar that has missed a stop).
So, those closely-spaced stops are not used all the time, but they do provide convenience for a non-negligible number of people. Furthermore, is not the whole point of express buses to provide faster service on very busy routes, by avoiding those very same closely-spaced stops? Is this not basically a solved problem?
It's especially critical in the suburbs, where stops may be closely spaced from the perspective of the trunk road which has bus service, but for the pedestrian part of the journey from one's house it might make a significant difference.
Steve: Your argument in part parallels my own on the subject of lesser-used stops. Streetcars do NOT stop at every stop unless the demand is there, and this reduces the walking distance for riders.
The stops at College & Clinton were removed without notice this week. Grace/College & Euclid/College are in operation. TTC claimed it's to improve timing, but it's a lighted intersection and a heavy traffic intersection most days and evenings. Even the bus drivers on the route were surprised by it.
Steve: Thanks to both who flagged this location. I missed it in my scan through the routes and thought Carlton had emerged unscathed on this round. It was not to be.
The question becomes balancing the need to stop for a single or pair of riders – versus the effort required for them to walk whatever the distance would be to the next logical stop. This really in my mind comes down to number at the stop, and distance to next stop. If it is 1 or 2 riders at a stop, stopping a full car and this saved the riders perhaps 100 meters of walking – I struggle – when it is 6 or 7 stopping a half full car, to save them 250 meters, well, that seems a different thing. It really does become a question of stop spacing, and density of use. This like LRT, a stop every 200 meters seems excessive, especially if particular stop use is light, a stop every 2,000 meters, well, makes it onerous to use. Downtown a stop every 300-400 meters does not seem to create either excessive walking or stops, but that depends on having to cross streets etc. You should not have to cross a major cross street to catch the Street car either where there is heavy traffic.
There seems to be a lot of confusion about the Parkside 501 stop. First week the streetcar was back in service, the automated announcements were skipping Parkside. Some drivers interpreted that as meaning they didn't have to stop there, others had a bit of initiative and stopped anyway if someone requested it or if there were riders waiting. Different drivers had different opinions on the official status of the stop. I contacted customer service via both email and Twitter requesting clarification, letting them know that both drivers and riders were confused. The email respondent said the stop was no longer in service, while TTC Helps told me the stop WAS in service. All further requests for clarification were ignored.
A week later, paper notices went up in the stairway leading up to the bridge saying the stop was out of service. So, it took them 2-3 weeks to provide any official information that wasn't contradictory, and then about 2 weeks later, the notices were removed and the stop was seemingly back in service. However, and this is grimly predictable, the automated announcer STILL doesn't announce it, so every time the stop is requested, riders get anxious because we have no idea whether this particular driver will be stopping at Parkside or at the next one that's been announced.
Multiply this one instance of incompetence by the number of stop changes you've listed above, and you've got a lot of confused riders across the city.
Steve: I was there on May 17, and the stop was announced westbound and was in service.
Not only that, the announcement for stops on the streetcars has NOT been restored to include Parkside Drive which had been eliminated when buses took over since there was no place for a bus to stop.
I was on an eastbound car and announcement was "Next stop: St.Joseph's hospital" HOWEVER the car stopped at Parkside Drive and people got off thinking it was the hospital since the operator did not bother to make an announcement to correct the automated system.
Here are the new stop spacings (using google earth) in the beaches …. note the TTC still does not have an accurate list up. The all stops on the 501 route page is actually missing stops.
Silver Birch to Neville Park – 230m.
For Glen Manor to Beech … there is a wheelchair cutout at the midway point at Balsam, however it is only on the eastbound side.
Steve: Do the new stop locations have cutouts, or is this something else they missed?
I think the eastbound Queen at Gladstone stop has been moved to be nearside. At least there was a stop pole there when I passed by westbound.
Steve: That makes sense. NextBus shows a stop at Sudbury which is the southern continuation of Gladstone.
Parkside Drive has Schrödigner's stop. It's half there and half not there. The quantum function only collapses when the streetcar stops there, or does not stop there.
Steve: But if there is nobody on the platform, is there anyone present to observe the stop?
As much as I'd rather it not happen, I've been expecting this to eventually happen on Broadview (specific stop modifications or removal) Avenue on the north-south 504/505 merged route (at least north of Dundas, the two routes share railway here), but it hasn't happened yet. The southbound stop at Wolfrey was moved about 40 yards north earlier this year, although the tram shelter right at the crosswalk stayed put where it's been for most of my lifetime. Being that the old, longtime stop was right next to a crosswalk that, sadly, is often abused by automobile drivers, I'm a little more comfortable with the streetcars stopping well enough back that cars have a better feel for where they (hopefully) will stop (and if they're on the right and following the rules, they'll be well behind the streetcar doors).
I'm a little disappointed that the Kingston/Woodbine westbound stop (502/503, with the side route terminating at the Bingham loop where the Coxwell 22A bus and Kingston 12 bus stops) has been removed. That was often where one of my only good friends in junior high and high school, with me in tow, would get on or off on our way home from school, and it had a lot of good memories for me.
Steve: The TTC tried to get rid of the stops at Mountstephen Street, but the local Councillor (Fletcher) objected, and so they remain.
My understanding of King / Trinity is that Pam McConnell was a strong proponent of this stop. When the issue of removing it (along with many other stops in front of churches) came up in 2014, she argued against it and won. She's no longer with us, and so neither is the stop.
The notification was posted at least 5 days before the stop was removed.
I am definitely concerned that the TTC people who did this will next turn their attention to bus routes. If the rationale is "stops should be at pedestrian crossings", then there are long stretches of suburban roads that have neither. And as far as I know, the traditional crossings with the pointing finger are being deprecated as undesirable and unsafe on faster streets.
As a simple example, Horner Ave. would have only two stops between Brown's Line and Kipling: at Beta St. and at Thirtieth St. This despite the fact that the blocks are oriented N-S in this area, so there are many residential streets running out to Horner. And those intermediate stops do get used.
In theory, it should be possible to roughly calculate whether to keep a stop, eliminate it, or add a new stop. The last item is particularly interesting. In spite of major growth in Toronto's population, with many new residential buildings and areas, we rarely hear about the TTC studying adding new stops.
The question can be expressed mathematically. Let R be the extra ride time for all the people on the bus incurred by a particular stop. Let S be the extra walk/cycle time incurred by the users of a particular stop, if that stop is eliminated, to get to the next stop.
P is the probability that the bus will stop at this particular stop.
A is the average number of people (this number may be fractional) that arrive at the stop during the bus headway.
If R>S, or N*T*P>E*A, then the stop should be eliminated. Conversely, if S>R, or E*A>N*T*P, then the stop should be retained. And the exact same logic applies to adding new stops at a proposed new stop location.
Let us consider a real life example, the Sunnybrook 124 bus. This is interesting because the vast majority of the demand is on the ends of the route. Most people get on/off at either Lawrence subway station or else at Glendon/Sunnybrook. However, there are a large number of little-used stops in between. So everyone on a packed bus waits while one person gets on or off at one of these stops.
Suppose we pick the stop at Lawrence and Wanless Crescent East. Let us try to estimate values for R and S. Based upon the totally unscientific method of "what I see when I am on the bus," I will estimate the average number of riders as 40 people. Various people have studied values of average stop time. See this article.
This gives R = N*T*P = 1.5 minutes. How about S?
In this case, S=E*A = 0.75 minutes. In this example, R>S so we should eliminate the stop at Lawrence and Wanless Crescent East.
One is the time lost by riders already on the bus, and the other is the extra time required for passengers who accumulate at the stop awaiting the bus' arrival.
You presume that the bus is full. This is not always the case, and the route you selected is unusual in having a very strong end-to-end demand. On a more important corridor this would call for a mix of express and local service.
You make no allowance for the time that might be saved by anyone alighting from the bus, only by a passenger boarding.
You equate the probability of stopping with the number of passengers using the stop. Both values are .15. In other words, about one time in seven a bus will stop for one passenger.
You make no allowance for the variable nature of stop delay that is affected both by demand (ons and offs) and more importantly by the presence or absence of a traffic signal. Stops at signals incur longer delays because the bus often will fall out of the traffic wave and catch a red light. TSP might fix this, but then we could also get into a discussion of how the delays to cross-street motorists fit into the equation.
Most importantly, you do not perform a sensitivity test, the most basic part of evaluating any formula. In effect, what happens if we start "turning the knobs".
It is important to note that because the bus does not stop all of the time, the delay is felt only by riders on the bus that actually does stop. In your example, 15% of riders are delayed, but the other 85% are not. Meanwhile, the would-be users of the stop face longer access times. It is well documented in transit literature that in-vehicle time is perceived to be less of a burden to demand than access and waiting time.
A simple example here is that your time lost by riders is 1.5 minutes while the time saved by one would-be rider is .75 minutes.
You have assumed an arrival rate that already has the headway built in so that it takes about 7 headways simply to accumulate one rider. The most frequent peak service on Sunnybrook is every 6 minutes, and off peak service is every 20. That's one rider every 42 minutes peak, or one every 2 hours and 20 minutes off peak. For all practical purposes, there is no demand here at all.
If the bus is only half full, or if there is more than one passenger using the stop, the relative values of your two factors shift substantially. You have used the worst-case situation.
Your formula justifies removal of stops more on heavily travelled routes where more riders would experience "delay", and it ignores the disincentive to transit use of making access more difficult. This is a last-mile problem in miniature.
The assumption that stops are kept for political reasons shows that your outlook already presumes that inconvenience to users of stops is of lower value to you, and can be dismissed as a "political" concern. No. People just don't want to walk further.
Please do not start a complex debate on the validity, or not, of your formula or my analysis.
Eliminating stops to make journeys a few seconds faster deserves closer scrutiny.
Has anyone polled riders to determine if their priority is fast service?
Or is frequent service more important? Or proximity to stops?
The TTC's ideal seems to be a block-long streetcar or bus that runs every half hour.
I'd rather take a shorter vehicle that stops more frequently and runs more often.
As Uber/Lyft etc. start to eat into fare revenue for transit systems, why is the TTC seemingly bent on opening the market for them?


text:
Bukhara Caravanserai was erected in the late 15th century over a trade route passing through the Shamakhi Gates of the fortress. It is close to the Maiden Tower. The caravanserai was harnessed as a hotel, basically catering to merchants of Central Asia.

The shape of the caravanserai building is square and surrounded by balconies and cells, and the portal is convex. The caravanserai has an octagonal courtyard as well as. The bulk of the architectural composition of the caravanserai has been formed by a variety of arches situated around the inner courtyard.

In the year of 1964, the Bukhara Caravanserai underwent restoration works and as a result of this process, the caravanserai building was separated from its annexes built earlier which made available to see the national monument on the background of the surrounding buildings.

The caravanserai building houses a restaurant which serves Azerbaijan national cuisine.

References

Caravanserais in Azerbaijan
Buildings and structures completed in the 15th century
Azerbaijani culture
Tourist attractions in Baku
Tourist attractions in Azerbaijan
Architecture in Azerbaijan
Icherisheher

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaWikipedia