Road Closure: Glastonbury Drive, Thursday, June 16, 2016, 7 a.m. to 5 p.m.

notices100x100By Staff

June 15th, 2016

BURLINGTON, ON
Glastonbury Drive, from street number 2293 to 2353, will be closed from 7 a.m. to 5 p.m. on Thursday, June 16, 2016 for emergency storm sewer repair work.

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Bruce Krushelnicki, city planner, to retire; most erudite staff member at city hall.

News 100 blueBy Pepper Parr

March 20, 2014

BURLINGTON, ON

Careers come to an end; the time to take off the harness and have it placed on the shoulders of someone who can build on the work you’ve done is one every professional faces.

That day for city planner Bruce Krushelnicki has been reported to the Gazette by a usually reliable source. Bruce will leave city hall sometime in May.

At some point all the data and all the public input gets placed in front of Burlington's Planner, Bruce Kruselniiki - who will issue a report and city council will make decisions.  Creating the downtown the city wants and needs has not been an easy process for Burlington.

A good listener, city planner Bruce Krushelnicki also explained difficult concepts better than most people.

Krushelnicki made significant contributions to the design of the city – there are, one can be sure decisions Krushelnicki made that he would not make again – but on balance Burlingtonians have been well served.

For young people wanting to develop careers as planners the opportunity to listen to Krushelnicki speak was like being in a classroom – they would slip away from their desks to hear someone who knew the field inside out.

He was the most erudite member of the city staff – he also knew the best tailor in town: Krushelnicki looked well outfitted in the pair of jeans he wore on casual Friday’s

When asked what form he thought the Strategic Plan released in 2011 should take he said, without cracking as much as a smile “A single page and in Latin.”

Krushelnicki has written a text on the workings of the Ontario Municipal Board and he may well return to that organization.

He would be very welcome as a lecturer in almost any school of architecture in the country.

The unfortunate part of his departure is that a number of important files come off the front burner. The Roseland Character Study gets put on hold; the development of the Official Plan slows down.

The Indian Point Character study was dead – there was to be a report on the lessons learned from that exercise – it may never see the light of day now.

The Gazette once asked Krushelnicki what he wanted to do when he retired and he said he would like to drive one of those large pieces of construction equipment.

We expect Bruce to aspire to more than that.

Drewlo-ramp-to-underground-garage-300x140

The ramp at the Drewlo development on Plains Road: there were supposed to be five of them, there are just four. City planner Krushelnicki pulled their building permit.

With some luck we will manage to do a final interview with Krushelnicki – expect to read some of the pearls of wisdom the man has to offer – he might even explain what is meant by a “top of bank” and why it is important – or how he brought the Drewlo development on Plains Road to a grinding halt when he pulled their building permit.

Polite, considerate, patient to a fault – but a tough nut when he had to be.

 

 

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Rain barrels by the truck load – brought to you by your Regional government. You pay for them – but a good deal.

By Staff

BURLINGTON, ON  April 25, 2012  They are going to sell them by the truck load and at $40 they are a steal.

The Region of Halton is setting up shop at the Mapleview Mall, lower parking lot on Saturday June 9 and will be on location from 8 a.m. to 12 noon.

Region making rain barrels available to Burlingtonians for $40. June 9th at Mapleview Mall

Each rain barrel is priced at $40 – cash only – and will hold  208 litre – 55 gallons of water.  They are made of a durable plastic containing recycled content.  The rain barrels fit into the back seat of an average sized vehicle and require minimal assembly. Residents are responsible for adapting their downspout to flow into the rain barrel.  All the instructions you need come with the barrel.

Putting in and using a rain barrel is an important part of outdoor water conservation; it allows you to reuse rain water that would otherwise go to waste,” said Gary Carr, Halton’s Regional Chair. He added that  “Since Halton began the truckload sales in 2009, almost 13,000 rain barrels have been sold, which at full use has the potential to reduce water consumption by 2.6 million litres.”

For more information about the rain barrel sales events or the water efficiency program please contact Halton Region by dialing 311 or 905-825-6000, toll free 1-866-442-5866, TTY 905-827-9833 or visit us online at www.halton.ca/waterconservation

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Report to our readers – when you open the door and the house is empty – were you robbed ?

By Staff

BURLINGTON, ON  February 17, 2011  –  Well, we weren’t robbed but when we went to open the door last Wednesday – there was nothing there.  It took a bit to figure out what had happened – someone misread a situation and a story and did something really stupid.

As a result we had to do an almost complete re-build of the web site which gave us a chance to make some changes that were on the back burner and make the site a bit more attractive – gave it a bit of a snappier look.

Then we have to reload all the stories – still work to do at that level – and of course get on with all the new and recent news. Four stories were loaded this afternoon

A young techie working with us did an incredible job of handling the rebuild.  He put in long hours and did some interesting work.  Odd though, how these younger people work today.  Us older types – you know the ones that were around in the 50’s – tend to stick to a task until it’s done – even if that means being up all night.

Our techie doesn’t bring quite that level of dedication. He clicked on to the web camera at Spencer Smith Park and saw all the ice on the Lake and immediately drove down to the park and walked out on the ice.  Whoa, I thought when I heard that – this is the brains that is re-building the system and he is out walking on ice?  How thick was that ice?  How ‘thick’ was that `techie?   But he survived and if you ask him he will tell you how thick that ice was.

Before the melt down we accumulated 3041 unique users in 118 days.  A unique user is someone who logs into the web site at least once from a specific computer.  The most read story –I’m almost ashamed to say this – was the story of a dog naming contest, second most read was the one on the soccer Mom’s.

Those 3041 users visited the web site 9,229 times in that 118 days and while they were there read 70,145 pages (seems like a lot doesn’t it) and while doing so spent an average of 7.5 minutes on the web site.  For a start up that cares only about Burlington – those are seen as good numbers – or at least that is what the experts tell us.

We made our share of mistakes and issued a correction each time there was an error.  Comments from readers were ‘”few” but robust.

The “beat” goes on.

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