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Oak Bay's crumbling infrastructure


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#21 todd

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Posted 09 April 2017 - 03:47 PM

It's not really that relevant anymore.  As I've indicated, fires are becoming more and more rare, and safety/alarm/suppression systems are getting better.  If the drive time is an 8 extra minutes, you might save one life every 10 or 15 years.  It's not worth it.

 

 

 

How about if it was your life?

 

 

 

Oak Bay has a lot of medical calls the fire department responds to... I think/ assume??? Are you saying to not use the fire department as an ambulance service and provide additional ambulance stations and ambulances attendances?



#22 VicHockeyFan

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Posted 09 April 2017 - 03:51 PM

^Sure, I'm fine with that.  I mean, golly, we have 3 fire halls in Victoria and we have a land mass 5x smaller than Saanich that also has 3.  I'm not sure why we have so much fire protection.


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#23 todd

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Posted 09 April 2017 - 03:56 PM

^Sure, I'm fine with that. 

 Is this going to be cheaper? Or is the motivation a better service?

 

 

 

^Sure, I'm fine with that.  I mean, golly, we have 3 fire halls in Victoria and we have a land mass 5x smaller than Saanich that also has 3.  I'm not sure why we have so much fire protection.

Isn't there more stuff on Victoria's land?

 

What is the call volume difference?


Edited by todd, 09 April 2017 - 04:15 PM.


#24 VicHockeyFan

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Posted 09 April 2017 - 04:16 PM

There are more fires in Saanich. More SFDs. More people. More serious car crashes.
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#25 todd

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Posted 09 April 2017 - 04:20 PM

Victoria have too much fire protection or Saanich have too little?



#26 VicHockeyFan

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Posted 09 April 2017 - 04:28 PM

They both have too much and need to change up to the realities of today's emergency services.
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#27 todd

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Posted 09 April 2017 - 04:32 PM

Most houses don't have a fire suppression system yet.



#28 VicHockeyFan

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Posted 09 April 2017 - 04:33 PM

Almost everyone escapes house fires. Firemen rarely make a timely save. YES, they do sometimes but it's very rare.
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#29 rjag

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Posted 09 April 2017 - 04:36 PM

Most houses don't have a fire suppression system yet.

 

Most houses dont catch fire!

 

But its an interesting point, I wonder if it could be an insurance requirement for SFD's to have hardwired intrusion/fire alarms to a monitoring station. I think its prob only $60-70 a month for this, I wonder how much of a discount on home insurance and property taxes could be applied to encourage that.

 

The other sticky thing about the firehalls is the Union and their lock on municipalities.....too much power



#30 todd

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Posted 09 April 2017 - 05:03 PM

Most houses dont catch fire!

 

But its an interesting point, I wonder if it could be an insurance requirement for SFD's to have hardwired intrusion/fire alarms to a monitoring station. I think its prob only $60-70 a month for this, I wonder how much of a discount on home insurance and property taxes could be applied to encourage that.

 

The other sticky thing about the firehalls is the Union and their lock on municipalities.....too much power

 

Why not just suppression systems?


Edited by todd, 09 April 2017 - 05:04 PM.

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#31 rjag

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Posted 09 April 2017 - 07:54 PM

Why not just suppression systems?

 

Suppression systems are expensive to retrofit into homes and can cause more damage than the fire itself. Plus all the risk of burst pipes and not enough water pressure. 

 

Monitored smoke/heat/CO2 detection makes way more sense especially unattended houses.


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#32 VicHockeyFan

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Posted 10 April 2017 - 05:41 AM

Suppression systems are expensive to retrofit into homes and can cause more damage than the fire itself. Plus all the risk of burst pipes and not enough water pressure. 

 

Monitored smoke/heat/CO2 detection makes way more sense especially unattended houses.

 

And for an unattended house, there is no major difference between a 7-minute response time and a 14-minute one (from a further fire hall).


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#33 Rob Randall

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Posted 10 April 2017 - 06:20 AM

I'm baffled and depressed as to why Oak Bay is struggling with these infrastructure issues.

 

OB has some of Canada's most expensive real estate. It has very little crime or fires for emergency services to worry about. 

 

If they can't handle their infrastructure deficiencies, what hope does any other jurisdiction have? Is infrastructure deficit an unsolvable problem?


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#34 VicHockeyFan

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Posted 10 April 2017 - 06:27 AM

They can handle it.  If they doubled their property tax rates, homeowners could whether the storm, could afford it.  Politicians would not survive it though.

 

Give the people something tangible above ground as you replace sewers/lines.  Probably most trees is not a good idea (roots/lines), but very nice sidewalks of improvements to driveways they cross comes to mind.

 

Where is the opportunities for non-invasive replacements?  ie, they now know what loads are on most pipes, where is the opportunity to drag in an inner lining flexible PVS pipe that while slightly slimmer diameter and less load capable, will be sufficient and much less costly than cut and cover?


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#35 rjag

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Posted 10 April 2017 - 06:30 AM

And for an unattended house, there is no major difference between a 7-minute response time and a 14-minute one (from a further fire hall).


Nonsense! If a smoke alarm is triggered and reported by a monitoring station in most cases the structure damage will be minimized. As it is usually caught well before the fire takes hold

#36 VicHockeyFan

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Posted 10 April 2017 - 06:34 AM

Nonsense! If a smoke alarm is triggered and reported by a monitoring station in most cases the structure damage will be minimized. As it is usually caught well before the fire takes hold

 

Yes, but 7-minutes vs. 14 minutes is no big deal.  In 100-Mile House, or Shawnigan Lake, fires are not caught for 35 minutes.  No big deal.


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#37 VicHockeyFan

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Posted 10 April 2017 - 06:37 AM

Department Overview:

Pagers alert the Shawnigan Lake Volunteer Fire Department members when there is an emergency call at any time of day or night. The fire fighters muster to 2 fire stations and a fire/rescue boathouse where there respond with the appropriate apparatus. The department consists of 30 members and has a command structure of 1-Fire Chief, 1-Deputy Chief, 2-Captains and 3-Lieutenants. The department derives authority to operate from a bylaw enacted by the Shawnigan Lake Improvement District to establish and operate a fire department within the boundaries of the Shawnigan Lake Improvement District.

 

The fire department uses in house computer training for the basic theory of fire fighting which complies with NFPA standard 1001 for fire fighter level 1. Members drill every Wednesday evening from 7:00 pm until 10:00 pm. Live fire training is done at a recognized training facility in Nanaimo for the different skill levels of fire fighting. The department has an in-house instructor for Red Cross first aid which includes the use of Automatic External Defibrillators, an in-house instructor for high angle and confined space rescue which meets NFPA standards, and an in-house instructor for Emergency Vehicle Operations.

 

 

Sounds great, but how fast can they actually get to the station, suited up, and to the fire?  But yet I hear nobody says they avoid buying property at Shawnigan Lake due to the very slow fire response (vs. Oak Bay).

 

http://www.shawniganfire.com/about/


<p><span style="font-size:12px;"><em><span style="color:rgb(40,40,40);font-family:helvetica, arial, sans-serif;">"I don’t need a middle person in my pizza slice transaction" <strong>- zoomer, April 17, 2018</strong></span></em></span>

#38 Mike K.

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Posted 10 April 2017 - 06:42 AM

Seven years ago some folks were saying Victoria should get its infrastructure in order before criticizing Oak Bay council for debating the Tinto Street rocks. Have a look-see: http://vibrantvictor...levard-oak-bay/

Of course, the issue of Oak Bay's crumbling infrastructure is no surprise. We've known for many years that there was a real mess over there but nobody wanted to touch it.

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#39 VicHockeyFan

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Posted 10 April 2017 - 06:48 AM

In fairness, even if you put if to a referendum, outlining the costs, Oak Bay residents would probably vote to defer it too.  I suppose also a few of them think they will be dead before the situation is critical.  Why pay now, for someone else's use over the next 50 years?


<p><span style="font-size:12px;"><em><span style="color:rgb(40,40,40);font-family:helvetica, arial, sans-serif;">"I don’t need a middle person in my pizza slice transaction" <strong>- zoomer, April 17, 2018</strong></span></em></span>

#40 Cassidy

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Posted 10 April 2017 - 06:57 AM

Oak Bay is merely a veneer of luxury and the "good life". 

 

In reality, it's stately houses, presumed desirability of South Oak Bay as a residential area, and huge Uplands building lots with some of Canada's most expensive houses are all just make-up on a donkey.

 

They're all situated in an incredibly poorly managed municipality with 75 year old, crumbling underground infrastructure, and civic buildings that are almost laughable in their age and condition.

 

Oak Bay seems unable to appreciate that they need to look after themselves, and that nobody else in the Capital Region is going to come along and fix their problems ... problems that will get far worse in the next decade, such that many issues will be juicy headlines related to the Capital Regions most expensive neighborhood also being the Capital Regions least desirable neighborhood.

 

Amalgamation would fix all that presumably ... but that's never going to happen, so Oak Bay really needs to start stepping up to the plate for their own sake.



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