Jump to content

      



























Photo

Canada Day in Victoria.


  • Please log in to reply
288 replies to this topic

#41 VicHockeyFan

VicHockeyFan
  • Suspended User
  • 52,121 posts

Posted 30 June 2009 - 05:03 PM

ICBC press release:

On Canada Day alone, there are approximately 20 alcohol-related crashes in B.C. resulting in 20 injuries and one death.


...leave your car at home, carpool and designate a driver in advance, call a cab, take transit or ask a sober friend to drive you home.



#42 Nparker

Nparker
  • Member
  • 40,221 posts

Posted 30 June 2009 - 05:40 PM

...take transit...


Just make sure you don't bring aboard any alcohol.

#43 sebberry

sebberry

    Resident Housekeeper

  • Moderator
  • 21,502 posts
  • LocationVictoria

Posted 30 June 2009 - 05:42 PM

Just make sure you don't bring aboard any alcohol.


Does that include the alcohol already in one's stomach?

Victoria current weather by neighbourhood: Victoria school-based weather station network

Victoria webcams: Big Wave Dave Webcams

 


#44 Nparker

Nparker
  • Member
  • 40,221 posts

Posted 30 June 2009 - 05:44 PM

Does that include the alcohol already in one's stomach?


Possibly. I am not sure how invasive the searches will be. To be safe, one should vomit as one enters the bus. :o

#45 sebberry

sebberry

    Resident Housekeeper

  • Moderator
  • 21,502 posts
  • LocationVictoria

Posted 01 July 2009 - 09:20 PM

Not seeing any coverage of the downtown festivities on TV. :(

Victoria current weather by neighbourhood: Victoria school-based weather station network

Victoria webcams: Big Wave Dave Webcams

 


#46 Phil McAvity

Phil McAvity
  • Member
  • 1,238 posts

Posted 01 July 2009 - 11:16 PM

Possibly. I am not sure how invasive the searches will be. To be safe, one should vomit as one enters the bus. :o


Yes, barfing on the driver is a sure way to get home.
In chains by Keynes

#47 martini

martini
  • Member
  • 2,670 posts

Posted 02 July 2009 - 01:29 AM

Just make sure you don't bring aboard any alcohol.

I wasn't even thinking after work and jumped on board with my loot. Obviously the driver was more distracted by the 'high spirited' load of adolescents on their way downtown.;)

#48 sebberry

sebberry

    Resident Housekeeper

  • Moderator
  • 21,502 posts
  • LocationVictoria

Posted 02 July 2009 - 09:12 AM

I wasn't even thinking after work and jumped on board with my loot. Obviously the driver was more distracted by the 'high spirited' load of adolescents on their way downtown.;)


Way to stick it to the man :)

Victoria current weather by neighbourhood: Victoria school-based weather station network

Victoria webcams: Big Wave Dave Webcams

 


#49 victorian fan

victorian fan
  • Member
  • 1,923 posts

Posted 02 July 2009 - 09:26 AM

Update: Victoria Police had arrested 30 people by the time the fireworks went off at 10:30 p.m. but still say Canada Day night was less troublesome than in recent years.

http://www.vancouver...0102/story.html

#50 VicHockeyFan

VicHockeyFan
  • Suspended User
  • 52,121 posts

Posted 02 July 2009 - 09:45 AM

I took a bus southbound across the Saanich/Vic border at about 8:00pm, it slowed at the roadblock but waived off the offered police search.

#51 B.Bridge

B.Bridge
  • Member
  • 108 posts

Posted 02 July 2009 - 10:12 AM

It was a lovely evening until I saw a guy get pushed through a plate glass window of a clothing store, dozens of police and security arriving with paramedics, followed by a very threatening long line of police motorcycles across Government as things were heating up, followed by the guy that stepped out centre street to moon them all (an extended full moon) followed by a chase through the crowd of three cops on motorbikes and one on foot to bring down the "ass", and then followed by what was a very close call with complete mayhem. I sensed a riot and high-tailed it. I have to say, the police did an excellent job. Things calmed down quickly soon after. It looked like A Channel got much of it on vid, as did the police.

#52 sebberry

sebberry

    Resident Housekeeper

  • Moderator
  • 21,502 posts
  • LocationVictoria

Posted 02 July 2009 - 10:24 AM

Update: Victoria Police had arrested 30 people by the time the fireworks went off at 10:30 p.m. but still say Canada Day night was less troublesome than in recent years.

http://www.vancouver...0102/story.html



I'm sure the police and BC transit will allow the ban of alhohol on the bus to take 90% of the credit for that instead of chalking it up to people simply behaving better this year.

Victoria current weather by neighbourhood: Victoria school-based weather station network

Victoria webcams: Big Wave Dave Webcams

 


#53 martini

martini
  • Member
  • 2,670 posts

Posted 02 July 2009 - 10:35 AM

What I don't get is how B.C. Transit can argue that they can't handle inebriated people on Canada Day at the same time they're considering running buses later at night to give the bar crowd the option of taking transit home and making buses free on New Year's Eve and promoting the bus to New Year's Eve celebrants.

I think there's a difference between the regular late night population compared to 30,000 gathering downtown in one evening.

#54 AllseeingEye

AllseeingEye

    AllSeeingEye

  • Member
  • 6,510 posts

Posted 02 July 2009 - 10:40 AM

Based on some of the goon-ish behavior I saw after the (so-called) fireworks show I thought the police did a superb job. If it were me I'd have been out there wailing away with my truncheon on some of the idiots I witnessed. Particularly the grossly intoxicated ones who insisted on weaving out in the middle of the streets in the middle of traffic and verbally abusing anyone in their path. Hey morons, here's a tip: your squishy inebriated self vs. my 2 ton Ford Explorer = Disaster waiting to happen. One of us would lose - and it wouldn't be me....

Back to the "fireworks": I knew there was a reason I hadn't bothered to attend a Victoria Canada Day celebration in 10+ years: ALL that preparation for barely a 10-minute show?! Geez.

Victoria needs to check out the Symphony of Fire in Vancouver to figure out what a real fireworks show looks like. For that matter the nightly firework display at Butchart Gardens beats Canada Day, hands down. There was a group of Aussies sitting in front of us on the Songhees; their comment was that Victoria 'definitely needs a lesson' in how to throw a party. No kidding. It was a good show - as long as it lasted, which wasn't remotely long enough. We barely got comfortable in our chairs, and then it was over. Overall, it was disappointing, IMO.

#55 Nparker

Nparker
  • Member
  • 40,221 posts

Posted 02 July 2009 - 11:27 AM

Victoria needs to check out the Symphony of Fire in Vancouver to figure out what a real fireworks show looks like. For that matter the nightly firework display at Butchart Gardens beats Canada Day, hands down.


The reasons the above fireworks displays may seem superior to the Victoria Canada day event is simple: funding. The former Symphony of Fire (now called the Celebration of Light) receives huge corporate sponsorship and as an international competition draws from a larger group of participants. As for the Butchart Gardens, their WEEKLY (not nightly) show during the summer is very much underwritten by not only their annual revenues, but the higher admission price during the summer. If the city received anything like the funding of the above two events it would be equally spectacular I am sure. Other than through federal money, does Victoria receive any funds from the other CRD municipalities to stage its annual display? If not, than non-Victoria residents should have to pay to attend - or of course we could do the more sensible thing and amalgamate.

#56 Phil McAvity

Phil McAvity
  • Member
  • 1,238 posts

Posted 02 July 2009 - 11:35 AM

I understand why the Symphony of Fire blows away Victoria's Canada Day fireworks because I would expect a big fireworks show in Vancouver to be more impressive than a show here, but how does one explain a small town in northern Ontario also blowing Victoria's show away? I was living in a town of about 12,000 in the dead center of absolutely nowhere last year and could not believe the fireworks show this town put on. It went on for about three times as long as Victoria's and was far more impressive. I think our ten minute excuse for a fireworks show is the worst i've ever seen but then you'd never know how pathetic it is until you see a real fireworks show.

I saved myself sending an e-mail to Jack Knox by running into him at Red Fish Blue Fish yesterday so I told him I think he is the best writer the T-C has and should be syndicated. He seemed genuinely embarassed by my praise.

They let people drive around the inner harbour last night? :confused:
In chains by Keynes

#57 sebberry

sebberry

    Resident Housekeeper

  • Moderator
  • 21,502 posts
  • LocationVictoria

Posted 02 July 2009 - 12:29 PM

Just make sure you don't bring aboard any alcohol.



Fundamentally there is no difference whatsoever between transporting liquor on a Tuesday and a Wednesday.

I laughed when I saw CHEK news interviewing two bus drivers who were in support of the ban, saying that it is "OK for one day of the year to impose these restrictions". Moments later, CHEK is asking people what they like about Canada and many of them replied "the freedom".

Ok, in the grand scheme of things while we party on the streets and people in other countries are fighting on the streets, we are a pretty free country and perhaps little things like this should just be ignored, but nevertheless it still bothers me.

I chose to not support an entity that imposes such rights-violating restrictions on riders and instead drove to a friend's BBQ, and I hope others here did so too.

Victoria current weather by neighbourhood: Victoria school-based weather station network

Victoria webcams: Big Wave Dave Webcams

 


#58 AllseeingEye

AllseeingEye

    AllSeeingEye

  • Member
  • 6,510 posts

Posted 02 July 2009 - 03:34 PM

I don't know Seberry: I understand your position but consider the American motto of "Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Happiness" (sometimes these days augmented also with "Equality").

Now contrast that with the historic sentiment in this country, to wit: "Peace, Order and Good Government". The latter is about as inspiring as dry paste but does point out one essential factor in the development of Canada, and one critical difference from the US.

And that is namely that "government" in all its manifestations - Good and Bad - has always assumed a more central focus and, by implication, acceptance here, and right from the founding of the Dominion. Personal rights and freedoms were never historically considered to assume primacy over "good government", as they were in the Republic to the south. The 1982 Charter of Rights and Freedoms may have been intended and in fact (perhaps) gone some distance in reversing that trend, but the notion of personal rights - for example, not to be searched on a bus by the police - is not nearly as deeply ingrained here as in the US. Hence it surprises me not one iota that more people here weren't terribly up in arms about the Canada Day 'searches'.

I'm not saying that I personally prefer our model (I do not) but, historically, government involvement/intervention here has always been easier to achieve - and with much less resistance by the general population - than in America.

#59 sebberry

sebberry

    Resident Housekeeper

  • Moderator
  • 21,502 posts
  • LocationVictoria

Posted 02 July 2009 - 04:16 PM

I'm not saying that I personally prefer our model (I do not) but, historically, government involvement/intervention here has always been easier to achieve - and with much less resistance by the general population - than in America.


Unless of course you are comparing us to the US's Patriot Act which virtually gives the police the right to strip search you on the spot.



http://news.yahoo.co...ool_stripsearch

While the supreme court officially ruled the search a violation of the teen's rights...

Justice Clarence Thomas dissented from the part of the ruling that Redding's privacy rights had been violated.

Thomas said the ruling "grants judges sweeping authority to second-guess the measures that these officials take to maintain discipline in their schools and ensure the health and safety of the students in their charge."


Victoria current weather by neighbourhood: Victoria school-based weather station network

Victoria webcams: Big Wave Dave Webcams

 


#60 aastra

aastra
  • Member
  • 20,570 posts

Posted 03 July 2009 - 10:18 PM

Awesome picture of the fireworks:



Picture by Ye Lu at Flickr.com
http://www.flickr.co...elu/3683416965/

You're not quite at the end of this discussion topic!

Use the page links at the lower-left to go to the next page to read additional posts.
 



1 user(s) are reading this topic

0 members, 1 guests, 0 anonymous users