What if the library gave patrons credit for early returns?

One thing that surprised me in discussions of the library charging for holds that aren't picked up is the number of people who are annoyed not just by people who don't pick up their holds, but by people who pick up their holds on the last day before they expire, or keep library materials check out right up until the due date.

I don't consider this a problem myself and I don't know if the library considers it a problem, but nevertheless my shower gave me an idea to address it:

What if libraries gave patrons credit for holds picked up early or books returned early? For example, using amounts that make the math easy and might not necessarily be the optimal ratio, suppose they credit one cent to your account for every day before the deadline that you either pick up a hold or return an item. Late fines are currently 10 cents a day, so this would mean that if you're a cumulative total of 10 days early in circulating your material, that will cancel out one day's late fine.

The big question here is whether circulating material faster is more important to the libraries than the revenue generated by fines. I don't know the answer to that question.

The other question is whether this would motivate people to game the system by taking out material they don't want and returning it right away. This incentive could be partially mitigated by allowing the credits to only offset future fines and you still have to pay fines already incurred. People could still game the system, but how many people are organized enough to game the system in anticipation of future late fines but not organized enough to get their books back in time? I don't know the answer to that question.

But if it turns out it actually is important for the library to encourage faster circulation of materials, this could be a starting point for brainstorming.

Why the idea of nominal fees for library materials grates

Recently, my city councillor asked for feedback on the idea of the library charging $2 to borrow DVDs. My visceral reaction was negative - a far stronger negative reaction than could be explained by the basic fact that libraries are meant to be free. At first I thought that this was because people who are least able to afford $2 for a DVD (like my grandmothers, for example) are also less likely to have the resources and the know-how to acquire movies for free through unofficial channels. But another aspect that grated was this treatment of certain library materials as Less Than other materials.

I've finally figured out why this is bothering me so much. It all goes back to my letter to my 18-year-old self. One of the things I wrote was:

Read Harry Potter. Read the complete works of Miss Manners. Read the In Death series. Read Introvert Advantage. Read Malcolm Gladwell. Watch Eddie Izzard's comedy and every interview he's ever done. These will all not only entertain you, but help you navigate the world better.

All of these things were transformative. From Harry Potter, I learned how to do literary analysis (yes, this is AFTER an academic career that involved lit courses in four languages) and how to use the happy place fandom gives me to chase away my dark moods. From Introvert Advantage I learned how my brain and energy work. Miss Manners gave me much-needed perspective on real-world social expectations to counteract the skewed context I grew up in. Eddie and In Death made me brave (insofar as I am brave, which is still exponentially braver than I was before I met them). Malcolm Gladwell taught me about Entitlement, which also coalesced all the other stuff I'd learned.

All of these materials are rather lowbrow. Anyone could make a convincing argument that any of this stuff is Less Than and Unworthy. Despite the fact that I've been exposed to more than my fair share of Serious Art and academic writing, it was a children's book series, a newspaper advice columnist, a couple of pieces of mass-market pop psychology/sociology, a transvestite comedian, and a series of formulaic mystery novels that ended up being what made me.

(At this point, some of you are thinking "What kind of pathetic person gets life-changing inspiration from such banal material?" The answer to that question is, obviously, "Someone who very much needs it.")

So, you're now asking, what does this have to do with the library?

Like most people, I don't like to pay for something when I don't know if it's going to work. This means that I don't buy books, movies, or other art/entertainment/information media if I don't know if I'm going to like it or if it's going to teach me what I need to learn from it. I borrow it from the library instead.

I didn't know going in that any of this stuff would be transformative. I didn't even know if I would like it. I added it to my library list because it seemed like it had the potential to be mildly interesting, but I never would have bought it - not even for a nominal price. There's enough pop cultural comfort food to keep me reliably entertained that I don't ever need to try anything new. The fact that I could try them all risk-free is what made it possible for me to discover all these things.

On top of that, there's also the fact that these transformative works are far from the only things I borrowed from the library during that time period (the past 8 years of my life). Most of the stuff I borrowed wasn't nearly as transformative - I'm sure I don't even remember 80% of it! But, because I can borrow as much as I want, I get to separate the wheat from the chaff and become a better person in the process. Even a nominal fee would be enough make me think twice before putting a hold on something I'm unsure about, which would have been enough of a barrier to prevent me from discovering my true inspirations.

I'm sure no one else has my exact combination of inspirations, and many people have a similarly unpredictable combination of inspirations out there waiting for them. (And I sincerely hope there are even more out there waiting for me!) The world will become a better and better place as everyone expands their horizons and finds their way to their own inspiration, so we must not introduce any cause for hesitation.

A mission for Toronto Public Library patrons

They've recently announced a new list of possible savings for the library to meet its reduced budget. I have a number of discrete thoughts on these, which I'm going to spread out over probably three blog posts. But we'll start with a simple mission for all library patrons.

One of the proposed savings is to charge people who don't pick up holds. This grabbed my attention because I recently had a hold that didn't turn up on the hold shelf. I looked through all the books on the shelf and it wasn't there even though the computer said it was. I was up to talking to people that day, so I went to the librarian. She looked through the hold shelves with me and couldn't find it either, so she placed another hold on the item for me and it came in a few days later. However, it still shows up on my account as a hold that I didn't pick up.

While we were looking through all the hold shelves, the librarian mentioned they'd had a few similar problems recently - apparently some glitch in the computer system. And it occurs to me that this is the kind of problem that would likely be underreported - it's very easy to just shrug your shoulders and renew the hold once its hold shelf time has expired rather than tearing a busy librarian away from their job.

So, in light of this potential new policy, here's a mission for all Toronto Public Library patrons: if your hold isn't on the hold shelf but the computer says it is, tell a librarian. If the problem I encountered is systemic or recurring, it needs to be reported to its full extent before the new policy comes into effect. And if it turns out it was completely temporary and has been fully resolved, then everything is fine and no one will have to go to any trouble.

What if quality of housing counted towards section 37 community benefits?

I was looking at City of Toronto documents for a proposed development, and I was surprised to see that the developer had to contribute a certain amount of money as "community benefits" to various projects in the area. Turns out this is set out in section 37 of Ontario's Planning Act. In basic terms, it means that if developers want more height or density than normally permitted, they have to give something back to the community in exchange. In the documents I was looking at, they suggested contributing money to parks or streetscape projects.

But what if developers could contribute their community benefits through quality of housing?

For example, what if they provided more family-sized suites, or lower prices, or more energy-efficient housing, or some combination of the above? What if they provided some of the suites for use as public housing? What if they reserved a certain number (or even all!) the suites for purchase by owners rather than investors or agents who are just going to buy and flip or rent them out for profit?

As an area resident, I find it beneficial to increase the supply of suites that meet my needs, even if I'm not immediately in the market for moving. If the supply increases, that might drive down prices, thus reducing my rent increase as well as making it easier to buy.

There would need to be measures to make sure that they don't introduce crappy housing as a baseline, upgrade it to normal housing, and call it a community benefit. There also need to be measures to make sure that this better-quality or better-value housing benefits actual residents, rather than getting snapped up by investors.

Off the top of my head, perhaps quality of housing could be measured relative to the rest of the neighbourhood. If it's basically the same as the rest of the neighbourhood, you get fewer points than if you're introducing the first building in the neighbourhood to have central air conditioning. This is analogous to how the City might try to encourage grocery stores to move into neighbourhoods that are food deserts, but wouldn't take any particular measures to encourage grocery stores to move into neighbourhoods that already have a couple of grocery stores.

To keep investors and flippers from yoinking better-value housing, perhaps the amount of community benefit credit the developer gets for building lower-priced units could be based on the number that are still occupied by the original owners after a certain amount of time. The flaw here is that the developers don't have much control over what people do with their units after they buy them, but they do have the power to stop these kinds of marketing techniques and instead focus on the actual community they're becoming a part of.

The dialogue surrounding development and intensification all too often seems to disregard the fact that what they're building are people's homes, and the people who live there will be citizens, constituents, and community members. I'd really like to see analysis of a development's impact on "the community" include the people who will be living there.

Teach me how layoffs work

Take the city’s buyout package now or you might be laid off later, Mayor Rob Ford warned 17,000 city workers who have so far spurned the effort to get them off the payroll.

Ford, appearing Friday morning on Sun News Network, was asked about layoffs in light of a Star story revealing that his administration now feels they are inevitable because of very low take-up of the city’s buyout offer.

“Now if they don’t take the package, what else do we have to do?” Ford said. “We might have to lay them off.”

If more of the eligible workers don’t agree to leave their jobs in exchange for up to six months’ salary, the city has no choice but to issue layoff notices to cut labour costs and tame the 2012 deficit, he said.

“The last thing we want to do is put somebody out on the street so we’re working and saying here, here’s a package, I’d advise you to take it. What else are we going to do?

“If someone else can come up with a solution, let me know.”

The internet's general interpretation of this statement is that people who volunteer will get packages, but if not enough people volunteer and the city has to forcibly lay off some people, those who are forcibly laid off won't get packages. I haven't been able to google up anything that explicitly confirms or disproves this interpretation. (If you have something more definitive, please do let me know in the comments.)

Is it normal to offer packages to those who volunteer to be laid off but not to those who are forced to be laid off? If so, why? The employer can afford to give packages to X people anyway, so why be so assholic about it? What does the employer gain by having people "volunteer" under duress rather than choosing who goes?

In the specific case of the City of Toronto, if they do in fact intend to offer packages only to people who volunteer, why are they encouraging more people to volunteer? If fewer people take packages, they'll have to spend less money. And if the general interpretation is incorrect and people who don't volunteer but are laid off anyway will in fact get packages, we're back to the question of why are they encouraging people to volunteer when they don't really want to?

Why it would not be appropriate for the library to charge for hold delivery

I've seen a number of comment-thread commenters suggest that, as a budgetary measure, the library should start charging to deliver holds. But that wouldn't be appropriate, because if the library were to charge for delivering holds, it would create a two-tiered system.

Popular novels tend to accumulate far more holds than the library has copies even before they're released. This means that all copies in the system are sent to people with holds on it, and (with the exception of the "Best Bets" section) none of the copies are in the library.

Currently, anyone can put a hold on a book, so everyone has an equal chance of getting at the book. You just have to get in line.

But if they started charging money for holds, only people who can afford to pay would place holds. This means that richer patrons would get at the books before poorer patrons, because the poorer patrons can't afford to get in line. Speaking as someone who could easily afford to pay a fee for this service if necessary, I consider that unfair, unacceptable, and contrary to the mission of libraries.

At this point, some people are thinking "But what if you can place the holds for free, just not have the delivered to your home branch?" The problem is that would still create a two-tiered system. Think for a moment about how such a system would work. Either patrons would only be able to put holds on books that live at their home branch, or they'd have to pick up the hold wherever the book happens to be. If we are limited to putting holds on books that live at our home branch, that's a two-tiered system because the pool from which we can place holds is significantly smaller. If we have to pick up holds wherever they happen to be, then we might have to go to any corner of the city - very likely over an hour by bus given how wide-spread our city is.

I also question whether that would actually save any significant amount of money given how often books need to be shipped around anyway. If you return a book at a different branch (say you return it at the branch near work even though you checked it out from the branch near home) they have to ship it home anyway. If it's already been subject to a delivery hold, it will need to be shipped home. And if they're shipping them to one branch anyway, how much more expensive could it be to ship it to another branch?

In any case, charging for holds would have the basic effect of allowing richer patrons to access our entire library system, while poorer patrons are limited to the collection at their local branch, which completely defeats the purpose the fantastic library system our city has worked so hard to build.

Why Rob Ford and his allies should be responsive to slactivism

Doug Ford says:

“Ford Nation is too busy working, paying taxes, creating jobs. That’s what they are doing.”

But then Rob Ford said:

“I encourage people to come to the executive committee next Thursday,” he said during an interview on CP24. “Everyone has five minutes to talk to me personally at our executive committee. I invite the whole city. I don’t care if we have to sit there for three days. I don’t want to have people ... they have five minutes to tell me what business do you think we should be in. And it’s next Thursday at 9:30 at city hall. Come and let me know what you think – the average taxpayer out there – what are we doing right, what are we doing wrong. I want to hear from the people and I encourage them to come.“

So if their base consists of very busy people, why do they insist that people make the time-consuming effort of going all the way down to city hall and waiting around all day to speak in person? As a person who is in fact busy working, I find that prohibitive. Shouldn't they be more responsive to emails? Petitions? Facebook groups? I've noticed on more than one occasion they seem to write off existing feedback as insufficiently effortful and encourage people to use other methods of communication. If their base consists of busy people, they should be making it easier, not harder, to state one's case.

The other other awesome thing about libraries

With silly attitudes towards libraries in the news lately and having recently lived through the hottest day of my life so far, I find myself thinking about another benefit of libraries: they're a place where everyone is allowed to be. Not just where everyone is allowed to go, but where everyone is allowed to be.

If you want to hang out in Tim Hortons, you need to buy a coffee. If you want to hang out in the mall food court, they can kick you out for loitering if they want. But you are allowed - and in fact welcome - to hang out in the library for as long as you want. It's climate-controlled, there are comfy seats, there's psychological privacy (you're in an open room, but people generally mind their own business, and no one will think it's strange if you find an inconspicuous nook somewhere and hide there), and there are no rules about what you should be doing apart from not disturbing others. You don't have to be doing schoolwork, you don't have to be using library materials, you don't have to be doing something serious or important, you don't even have to be awake. You're just allowed to be there, for as long as it's open, doing your own thing.

It's very easy to forget how important this is when you're in a position of privilege. I myself don't hang out at the library that often, I tend to just swoop in, pick up my books, and go home. But that's because home is a comfy, internet-equipped, air-conditioned apartment that I have all to myself. Not everyone has that privilege. If home is too crowded or noisy or uncomfortable or abusive or non-existent, having somewhere else to go - a perfectly respectable place to go and to be (compare the connotations of spending hours in the library vs. spending hours in the bar) - can be a lifesaver. And once you're there, it's full of tools for educating and improving yourself or, worst case, quietly amusing yourself.

And despite the fact that it's of such value to the most marginalized people, it is not by any means charity. It's something literally everyone uses.

How long do we have to keep stating the obvious for?

Despite the bombshell nature of many of the cuts suggested this week by a city-hired consultant, there is no stampede of Torontonians signing up to tell the politicians face-to-face, or in writing, how they feel about them.

I'll admit it never occurred to me to tell politicians how I feel about them. You know why? Because it's so blatantly obvious that they're destructive and unworkable, and I figured it's just as blatantly obvious to anyone who lives in the world. The KPMG study proves that there simply aren't workable cuts to be had by listing what few remaining things could even legally be cut. It isn't advocating cutting these things, it's pointing out how destructive large-scale cuts would be by saying that these important things are the things that would remain to be cut if large-scale cuts were to happen.

It really frustrates me that not wasting my time stating the obvious to politicians could be interpreted as support for or indifference to such destructive measures. And I think, on top of all the damage already being done to our city, this need to constantly be loudly shouting the obvious at the top of our lungs is also destructive to our city, because it takes away energy that could otherwise be used to think of ways to make things even better.

It's like if you had to say to every person you encountered "Please don't hurt me," and if you didn't they'd hurt you. That would be really draining, wouldn't it? You have to be totally on top of making sure you noticed every single person around you and said "Please don't hurt me" to them, plus it would preclude saying "Hi, how are you?" or "I love your shoes!" or "Can I pet your doggie?" And on top of that, it would also take up the energy you need to think "This sidewalk would be more easily navigable if the planters were flush with the curb" or "Hey, that store might sell greeting cards" or "What if I used the egg slicer to slice the mushrooms?"

Real life operates under a tacit assumption of the obvious. Of course people don't want you to hurt them. Why can't politics do the same?

On Rob Ford and Pride

During the last municipal election, I had a theory (which I don't think I blogged) that Rob Ford doesn't really want to be Mayor of Toronto. He either thinks he does or thinks it's what he's supposed to do (or some combination thereof), but he doesn't actually want the reality of it.

Sometimes in this theory the emphasis was on the word "Mayor". He doesn't want to be Mayor of Toronto. It sounds glamourous, but he doesn't actually want the reality of it. It's like when you're a kid and you want to be a princess - you don't actually want to be in the public eye all the time and have to shake hands and cut ribbons and marry some minor German noble and produce offspring. You just want a poofy dress and a unicorn - or a big chair and a shiny necklace, as the case may be.

And sometimes in this theory the emphasis was on the word "Toronto". He didn't seem so very into our urban nature, with a wide range of people doing a wide range of things all crammed into a relatively small geographical area. It seems like he would be happier somewhere smaller, more homogenous, less urban.

Mr. Ford's recent decision not to attend Pride seems to support this theory of mine.

As an individual, I do get not wanting to go to Pride. It's so big and loud and crowded! But that's part of being Mayor - you have to put in an appearance at the big events. Not doing so reads as a diss.

As an individual, I do get not wanting to do something that makes you uncomfortable. It's so much easier just to stay home! But one thing I've learned in life is the higher you rise, the more power and privilege and authority you get, the more you have to be brave and just do it - smile and shake hands and talk at the meeting and get on the plane and give the presentation. And when you have the power and privilege and authority of being Mayor, you have to show up and smile and wave at your city's big events.

As an individual, I do get wanting to go to an enjoyable family event rather than a public event you have no interest in. But that's part of being Mayor - your private life doesn't get to take precedence over public life. That's why they call it public office.

But the advantage of being Mayor is that you can use your status as a VIP to tailor your experience so it's a better fit with your personal preferences. Don't want to stay the whole parade? Put in an appearance, then have your entourage whisk you off to your next cleverly-scheduled appointment. Don't want to walk in a parade on a hot day? Surely you can get a ride in a car or a float or a firetruck. People just too scary? You can physically surround yourself with handpicked advisors or city councillors so you have a buffer until you get more comfortable with your surroundings.

And the advantage of this being Toronto is that there will be a warm reception for someone whom the public knows had to be brave to go to Pride and succeeds in doing so.

But chickening out is unmayoral. Spurning high-profile public events because you just don't wanna is unmayoral. And spurning Pride when your are in a role that traditionally attends is unTorontonian.

The standard that the Mayor attends Pride has existed for decades. The standard that major elected officials put in an appearance at major public events even if their own preference is to do something else has existed since before any of us were born. Anyone who isn't willing to meet these standards shouldn't run for Mayor, at least not of Toronto.

Things They Should Invent: measure the non-NIMBY vote

In Local Motion, there are two stories of excessively NIMBY behaviour. In one case, a family put up a fence in their yard so the kids could play safely, and the neighbours objected because the norm in the neighbourhood was not to have fences. In another, a family wanted to tear down their old house and build a new accessible one to accommodate member of the household's disability, and the neighbours objected because of the historical nature of the house being torn down.

Both of these cases ended up having public meetings held about them, and it occurred to me that this is inherently unfair. Do you want to go to a public meeting about the Jones's fence? If you think their fence is an outrage, your answer is going to be "Hell yeah!" But if you don't care either way about their fence, your answer is going to be "Of course not, I don't care if the Joneses build a fence!" The vast vast majority of the neighbourhood might be completely indifferent, but the Joneses still find themselves in a public meeting facing dozens of angry opponents. No one is going to bother to go all the way to a public meeting and stand up in front of people just to say "Really, I do no care one bit," but most of the neighbourhood probably feels this way.

Non-NIMBYs often truly don't care, and may even think the issue is none of their business. This makes them harder to count, but we really do need to come up with a way to have the indifferent vote counted without requiring too much effort by the indifferent.

Why you shouldn't report graffiti on private property to 311

I recently saw at the bottom of a City of Toronto ad a friendly little note saying "If you see graffiti vandalism in your neighbourhood, call 311."

Doesn't that sound helpful? After all, we all know that 311 is extremely helpful. So doesn't it sound like the nice 311 people will send some nice helpful city workers (maybe these guys?) to clean it up.

But it turns out that if the graffiti's on private property, you'll just be getting the property owner in trouble.

According to the City of Toronto website:

When City staff enforce compliance with the graffiti bylaw they try to provide owners with as many ways as possible to comply.

An bylaw officer will educate the property owner or occupant about the issue and require graffiti removal. The officer may issue written notice. The owner is given fixed time period that they have to comply (remove the graffiti), e.g. 72 hours. If the owner provides justifiable reason for not complying within an appropriate period of time (cannot paint when it is raining, freezing, etc.), the bylaw officer will adjust the complying period.

Note: If the property owner does not comply within the specified compliance period, the City will remove the graffiti and the cost will be added to the tax roll.

Therefore, if you report graffiti on private property, by-law officers will come and force the property owner to remove it promptly, and if they don't they'll be forced to pay for it.

The property owner is already the victim. They already know they have to get rid of the graffiti, and they're probably already trying to figure out how to clean it off or scrape up the money to get someone else to do it. Sending by-law officers around to nag them is unproductive, and, frankly, a dick move.

The City cleans up graffiti on City property, so reporting that is productive. But I would strongly recommend not reporting graffiti on private property. I'd much rather live in a city with graffiti around than live in a city where victims of crimes get nagged by law enforcement to recover faster.

Wherein the Toronto Star makes me ashamed to read it

I was shocked, ashamed, and rather disgusted to see this article in the Toronto Star, where reporters staked out public figures' homes to see if they were participating in Earth Hour.

First of all, Earth Hour is arbitrary and symbolic. No one is hurting anything by failing to participate. (Yes, they are using a normal hour's worth of electricity. Our infrastructure can handle that, and that's within the scope of perfectly normal and customary human behaviour in our society.)

Second, all the people they were picking on were quietly sitting at home minding their own business. As I've blogged about before, the big problem with Earth Hour is that anyone who chooses to quietly sit out and go about their own business in the privacy of their own home is lit up like a beacon. That, in and of itself, is reason enough to question the ritual.

Third, the public figures whose homes they were visiting have not to my knowledge, within reach of my google-fu, or in any way cited in the article endorsed Earth Hour. Instead, they're people the Star thinks should be endorsing Earth Hour. This isn't a story of hypocrisy or anything, at best it's a story of quietly opting out.

Fourth, the public figures weren't even home! The people in the homes were their families (in at least some cases their minor children), who are private citizens and thereby fully entitled to sit quietly at home without participating in the public events of the day.

But, most crucially, this is the Toronto Star. It's a Toronto newspaper and it's a broadsheet newspaper, and by printing this story it has egregiously failed in its mandate as both. If we wanted busybodies constantly judging and shaming us for not living up to their arbitrary standards, we wouldn't have moved to the city. If we wanted sensationalized pearl-clutching finger-pointing, we'd be reading the Sun.

If their goal was to make their readers ashamed to be seen with a copy of the Star, they have succeeded.

How to set politicians' salaries

There's been some debate recently here in Toronto about whether our city councillors should get a pay raise. On one hand, they already get way more money than most of us and the city is short on money. On the other hand, it would be morally wrong for me to oppose a cost of living increase for anyone. I don't object to politicians being paid more than me. They don't have job security, they're subject to public scrutiny, and usually have to quit (or at least take unpaid leave from) their regular job just to run for office (with no guarantee of being elected.) But there needs to be some way to make their pay reflect the average citizen's situation.

So here's what I came up with.

Each politician's salary is the sum of the following numbers:

• the median individual income in the jurisdiction they represent
  
• the median individual income of all people represented by their level of government
  
• the median individual income of the poorest 20% in the jurisdiction they represent
  
• the median individual income of the poorest 20% represented by their level of government

(For the purposes of this post, "the jurisdiction they represent" means a ward at the municipal level and a riding at the provincial or federal level. "People represented by their level of government" means everyone in the city, province, or country at the municipal, provincial, and federal levels respectively.)

If the sum of these four numbers is not within a range that's commensurate with current salaries for that particular government, then the total is multiplied by a coefficient. The coefficient is whatever number will make the average salary under the new system equal to the average salary under the old system. The coefficient will then remain constant year to year.

The result of all this is that politicians would have an immediate personal investment in the fortunes of their own constituents and their level of government as a whole. The poorest 20% receive extra weight to make sure we don't create an incentive to make the very rich excessively richer (thus bringing up averages) while ignoring ordinary people. Similarly, we're using median instead of mean because of what we learned here, although I'd accept mean if there's a sound argument for it.

Possible issue: under this system, representatives of ridings with higher incomes would get more money.

Possible mitigating factor: maybe that will just mean that their income is commensurate with the cost of living in the riding, so it might all even out.

Another possible issue: "star" candidates who are parachuted in to ridings where they don't live because the parties think they can win will have more incentive to pick richer ridings.

Possible mitigating factors: 1. Might this already be happening anyway? 2. Would it actually affect the results that citizens get?

Things They Should Invent: political system wherein you only have to express your opinion once for it to count

This post was inspired by this development.

A lot of activism is repeating the same message over and over and over again. You have to sign petitions and write letters to the editor and attend rallies and contact your elected representatives and repeat the same thing over and over and over.

That's inefficient. We need a system where you express your opinion once to the pertinent people, and that's sufficient. And expressing your opinion more than once gains no further reward, and perhaps even annoys people and/or is detrimental to the credibility of your cause.

Case in point: I wrote a cogent and persuasive email to the appropriate elected representatives about the importance of Transit City to me personally and to our city as a whole. But now there are people convinced that I don't really care about Transit City because I didn't attend this one rally that I didn't know was a rally, or because I sent an email instead of making phone calls, or because I didn't skip work and attend some city meeting. And meanwhile I've been spending the past month thinking constantly about what I can do to convince the powers that be that Transit City is important.

Wouldn't the world be a better place if that one email was literally all I could do, and the powers that be would give it precisely my share of all due consideration no matter how much noise the other people make? Then my attendance at the rally would be redundant (maybe we wouldn't need to go to all the trouble to have rallies at all!) and I could have spent the past month putting my thoughts and energy into a wide range of other things, all of which could also be knocked off with a single well-composed email. Politicos' offices would run more smoothly, people would feel more engaged in the political process, people could inform themselves about and commit effort to a wider range of issues, and the world would be a better, more informed, less stressful place.

Analogy for the current state of municipal politics?

The following is a quote from Jared Diamond's Guns, Germ, and Steel, on the subject of why and how China lost its technological advantage over Europe.

The end of China’s treasure fleets gives us a clue. Seven of those fleets sailed from China between A.D. 1405 and 1433. They were then suspended as a result of a typical aberration of local politics that could happen anywhere in the world: a power struggle between two factions at the Chinese court (the eunuchs and their opponents). The former faction had been identified with sending and captaining the fleets. Hence when the latter faction gained the upper hand in a power struggle, it stopped sending fleets, eventually dismantled the shipyards, and forbade oceangoing shipping.

[...]

That one temporary decision became irreversible, because no shipyards remained to turn out ships that would prove the folly of that temporary decision, and to serve as a focus for rebuilding other shipyards.

[...]

From time to time the Chinese court decided to halt other activities besides overseas navigation: it abandoned development of an elaborate water-driven spinning machine, stepped back from the verge of an industrial revolution in the 14th century, demolished or virtually abolished mechanical clocks after leading the world in clock construction, and retreated from mechanical devices and technology in general after the late 15th century. Those potentially harmful effects of unity have flared up again in modern China, notably during the madness of the Cultural Revolution in the 1960s and 1970s, when a decision by one or a few leaders closed the whole country’s school systems for five years.

The first thing that came to mind as I read this was the harmful and far-reaching decision to kill Transit City. Is Toronto being collapsed?

Analogy for "people want subways"

In one of the newly-built condo buildings in my neighbourhood, there's this gorgeous penthouse. Massive suite, south and east exposure, lots of rooms - a dining room and a breakfast nook and a fricking library! - and priced well into the range of $2 million.

I want it.

Now let's suppose, for plot purposes, I'm engaged and pregnant. I'm very soon (and non-postponably) going to have to be able to house my growing family. So I do the sensible thing and but a down payment on a condo that's big enough for three. It's a nice, clean, safe, sensible two-bedroom. Nothing posh, but it will do the job far better than the tiny one-bedroom I'm currently living in. A two-bedroom is a bit out of my price range, but my parents give me some money to help me out. In general they don't believe in helping out adult children financially, but they do see the value of this specific investment to make sure that their future grandchild is properly housed.

So all this happens. I'm gestating away, we've scheduled a wedding date and a move-in date, I've given notice to my landlord, I've signed all my mortgage papers and figure out how I'm going to budget for it and made a written agreement with my parents for their contribution...and then one day I google upon the floor plans of the gorgeous penthouse.

And I decide I want it.

So I abandon the condo I've already put a down payment on. I abandon my moving plans. I tell my fiancé "You're either with me or against me". And I insist on staying in my apartment until I can afford to move into the penthouse.

It's very likely I'm never going to afford the penthouse, and if I can it won't be any time soon. The baby will be born and we'll be too crowded in the interim. My parents might not give me any more money after I've thrown away my sensible plan on a whim. Because I've already given my landlord notice, they might jack up the rent if I want to stay (as they normally jack up the rent between move-outs and move-ins). My fiancé may or may not stay on given the crazy way I've been acting, and if he decides to leave it will be even harder to afford the penthouse and all the problems will worsen.

Wouldn't it be far better in every respect to move into the sensible condo and take proper care of my family until such time as we can afford the penthouse? My marriage would survive, my child would have a room of her own, I would retain the trust (and potential for future funding) of my parents, and life would be better for everyone.

This is how the people of Toronto feel about subways. Yes, we want subways. Of course we do! But we can make life better for far more people far sooner and make the transit network as a whole more resilient with Transit City, which is already planned and funded and ground-broken and ready to go. It is far more important to build something already than to delay any more in pursuit of the absolutely perfect plan.

Of course, the flaw in my analogy is that if I had put a down payment on a condo, I could probably eventually sell it and recoup my investment. But there's no way to recoup the money already invested in Transit City or the penalties that will be charged for breaking massive contracts with suppliers.

Things They Should Invent: use the TTC surplus to give everyone free rides

It seems the TTC has a $60 million surplus.

If they aren't allowed to keep and reinvest the surplus (I've heard that it isn't, but haven't been able to verify from an official source), they should be allowed to use it to give us free rides.

This idea was inspired by a comment on Torontoist by W. K. Lis. In response to the fact that the TTC is giving free rides on New Year's Eve at their own expense because they didn't get a sponsor this year, W. K. Lis said:

The TTC has a $60 million surplus this year. They would have to hand that surplus over to the city and then fight for it back next year. Better to use it up this year by giving it back to those who actually helped get the surplus, the riders. Even though it is only for one night.

That got me thinking: what if they did the same thing for more nights to use up the rest of the surplus?

According to this press release, it cost about $90,000 to provide free TTC between midnight and 4 a.m. on New Year's Eve. There are a few variables we're not seeing here (overtime pay, free fare increasing ridership and increased ridership increasing cost of free fare), but let's use that as a starting point to get the idea across.

If it costs $90,000 to provide 4 hours of free transit, then it costs 6*90,000=$540,000 to provide 24 hours' worth.

60,000,000/540,000 = 111.111111...

Therefore $60 million could buy 111 days (or just under 4 months) of free transit.

They might not want to use all of it, to leave some leeway in case of unforeseen circumstances or something, but maybe they could offer 2 or 3 months of free transit. Just announce "From January 1 to February 28, everyone rides free!" All Metropass subscriptions are suspended for these two months, and then the March Metropass is sent out as usual.

There would be a number of benefits. First and foremost, it would save Torontonians money! The poorest among us wouldn't have to wonder whether they should spend $3 on a bus ride or save money and walk during the coldest months of the year. There would be a bit more motivation for car people to walk rather than drive in bad winter weather, and every car that gets off the road will make life easier for the cars that are still on the road. Customer service might improve because TTC workers no longer have to worry about enforcing fare collection (my theory is that the need to enforce fare collection is at the root of most poor customer service). It would also get more people in the habit of taking transit, and some of them might stay in the habit. It's also possible the TTC could save money simply by not having to deal with fare media for a couple of months (don't have to print passes and transfers and tickets.)

Obviously the ideal is to reinvest the surplus, but if that isn't allowed they could certainly do worse than to give it back to Torontonians in kind.

More information please: how does Rob Ford's transit plan help the Pan Am Games?

Conventional wisdom is that Rob Ford's transit plan is focusing on Scarborough because of the Pan Am Games. But I just looked at a map and I don't think it makes sense to me.

Here are the things I know:

1. Rob Ford's transit plan (PDF) extends a subway along Sheppard to Scarborough Town Centre. Right beneath the subway map is a caption saying that it will be "in time for the Pan Am Games".

2. The major Pan Am Games facility in Scarborough will be the aquatic centre at U of T Scarborough.

3. Scarborough Town Centre is a 28 minutes bus ride from U of T Scarborough.

So how does this help for the Pan Am Games? I'm not super familiar with that part of Toronto, so it may be something that's obvious to people who spend more time there. What I'm seeing is a second route to a transit hub that's 28 minutes away from the Pan Am Games site, but nothing to help people get to the Pan Am Games site itself. What am I missing?

Things I Don't Understand

1. What exactly is an "Alice in Wonderland" attitude towards terrorism?

One of the Wikileaks memos said Canada has an "Alice in Wonderland" attitude towards terrorism. I've read the article several times, and I still don't understand what exactly that expression means. Alice in Wonderland = falling down rabbit holes? Eating magic mushrooms that changes your size? I don't see what they're trying to say here. Can anyone enlighten me?

2. What's Rob Ford's angle in building a subway only in Scarborough?

Rob Ford wants to kill all the Transit City work currently underway and instead build a little bit of subway in Scarborough.

What's his angle on choosing Scarborough?

Two of the current Transit City projects - the Finch West line and the Eglinton Crosstown line - connect Etobicoke to the existing subway lines. Etobicoke is where Ford's old ward and the core of his support is located, and yet he makes a decision that very deliberately takes away any hope of transit improvement from this entire half of the city. He could have proposed Finch for his little subway (linking the top of the U along the way to make a more resilient loop). He could have let them keep building the underground part of the Eglinton Crosstown with a platform of working towards extending the rest of it underground, which would, again, make the system more resilient and make Torontonians feel their government is working towards a subway to the airport (which benefits everyone who ever needs to go to the airport.)

But instead he chose an option that completely ignores his core constituency. What's his angle?