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Agreed, the cost of food, shelter, clothing, and transportation is going up like crazy, while electronics go down.

* Summer of 2007, I bought a 50 inch TV (1366x768 resolution) for $3500 Canadian. Today, 48-to-50 inch TVs (1920x1080 resolution) can be had for $350. That's a 90% drop in price.

* Stuff you really need, like food, shelter, clothing, and transportation has been constatnly increasing. I remember my first car, a new 1974 Ford Maverick 4-door. It cost $4,070 including taxes. Nowadays a compact 4-seater is at least $20,000

http://transit.toronto.on.ca/s...

TTC Fare Structure, July 1, 1954:
> Adult day fares: 15cents cash; 5 tickets for 50cents 20 tickets for $2.
> Children: 5cents cash; 6 tickets for 25cents
> Scholars: 10 tickets for 55cents

http://ttc.ca/Fares_and_passes...

As of January, the fare structure will be
> Adult (cash) $3.5
> Adult (token or Presto-card) $3.00
> "S" fare (Senior or Student) (cash) $2.10
> "S" fare (Senior or Student) (ticket or Presto-card) $2.05

Food, clothing, and housing (own or rent) have also skyrocketed. See http://www.thepeoplehistory.co... for some scarey numbers. To summarize... the current "2%" number is an an outright lie. The real number is a lot worse for people in the working class.

Hmmm. I didn't think about the overlapping warranty issues. I'll have to give you that those numbers for the unscheduled maintenace costs might be bogus then. At worst however it means that the hybrids are comparable to standard vehicles in maintenance costs.

Also, what I said about the battery packs still stands. The whole bit about having to replace them is a red herring. If it happens, it'll be an exceptional event akin to blowing your engine in some catastrophic way, about as rare and about as expensive.Also, what I said about the battery packs still stands. The whole bit about having to replace them is a red herring. If it happens, it'll be an exceptional event akin to blowing your engine in some catastrophic way, about as rare and about as expensive.

I couldn't find the total cost differences numbers you cite. Can you provide a specific link or description on where the numbers are at? I looked at their price calculators and those tools did not support the hybrids being dramaticaly more expensive.

Nor do those numbers make any sense. Hybrids are not that much more expensive to initially buy than ICE cars, they get better gas mileage, and are at least comparable in terms of maintenance costs. Where is this +$16K for total cost difference for a Prius coming from?

There are a lot of companies and governments trying out hybrids for taxi and fleet vehicles, and they mostly report that they are doing well with them. If you google for hybrids and taxis you find more positives than negatives, and they generally report total cost savings, not dramtic cost increases. If the numbers you cite were real, nobody other than a few rich eco-freaks would use hybrids. They would join the all electric cars in the nice try category.

Efforts like this may slow the effects of the decline somewhat but I suspect that they'll lower where we bottom out at, too. Technology and conservation might be able to dig us out of this hole that we've dug ourselves into, but I don't think we're clever enough to deal with the issues central to this problem. In a nutshell, the people are the problem and they're not going to want to change.

"Of the 2,509 libraries Andrew Carnegie constructed throughout the English-speaking world..only five...he actually endowed... All other towns...were required to subsidize their library by an annual amount that, at least, equalled ten-percent of the cost of the library building, an arrangement soon dubbed The Carnegie Formula."

The formula encouraged community involvement in the library progran, but it also meant that the richest of cities would get the lion's share of the grants. Toronto's Carnegie Libraries

No Toronto and Chicago seem pretty similar:

Toronto the city has a population of 2.48 million people, and there are 5 million in the greater Toronto area (cities touching Toronto).http://www.city.toronto.on.ca/toronto_fac ts/diversity.htm

Chicago has 2.9 million people in the city and 5.4 million in the county.http://www.chipublib.org/004chicago/chifact s.html

Why do you say Chicago has 1 million more people ?

A Slashdot First!

All the hotel web sites have been slashdotted.

... in Toronto in March 2006

http://www.city.toronto.on.ca/economic_profile/

One quarter of Canada's population lives within a 160 kilometre (100-mile) radius of Toronto.

More info:
http://www.city.toronto.on.ca/water/deep_lake/
Video:
http://www.enwave.com/enwave/news/?s=dlwc&ReleaseI D=53

Posted AC cuz I modded here (torstenvl)

postnumber % 1000000 == 0 ?

I must apologize -- I forgot Slashdot was peer reviewed :-/

I must apologize -- I forgot Slashdot was peer reviewed :-/

This concept has just been rolled out in downtown Toronto with a system called Dexit.

The Dexit chip comes either as a key fob or a sticker for your cell phone. Most of the merchants in the PATH (downtown underground network) have a Dexit reader at their till, which reads the Dexit RFID tag.
The cost is $1.50 for every $100 you load on the card, with no transactional fees. It claims to be "easier than cash, faster than credit", but the big value proposition seems to be food - most food merchants won't take debit cards due to time constraints, but they will take Dexit.

Oh, this is great, eh. Bombadier invents the anti-snowmobile.

Well, that's not entirely true... it's got a lot in common with the snowmobile:
It's useful for a whole two months out of the year, it kills half the people who ride it, and only costs a bit more than thirty years' infinite travel on the TTC.

Locking a bicycle at the train station definiteyl seems like a good option. Most train stations have bicycle racks these days. The really nice thing about getting a cheap bicycle (aka a "beater") is that probably nobody will still it.

The city of Toronto has a nice page on bicycle user tips

Like you said, the application was not clustered, did you not make it clear to your client that they are not protected in that situation and they should accept the risk or else cough up some money.

Yes I did. There was a complete plan, the money was there as well, but because managment wanted to look good (read: Not spend money and come in "under budget") they never signed off.

In case your application ever gets clustered, you could perhaps lower the cost of the contract by taking something less critical like 'same day' repear instead of '2 hours' or something.

It is clustered now and the contract was (when I left) still the same. Why? Because Murphy, they want / need to get the cluster back in a sane state as quickly as possible, the DB is at the core of the business (call center, Web Interface, IVR) if they don't have it, they can't do business.

secondly, I have been dealing with sun support and it is nothing special compared to IBM or HP. I don't think it is 100% worth the money. although you almost have no other choice then to pay, going without support is impossible for serious businesses.

I've dealt with HP and SUN, not with IBM though.

What I can say about HP is that the company in itself is a little bit suspect. The last shop I worked for bought a VA7400 besides the XP512. The VA never really worked. Before I left it decided to croak pretty serisouly, the recommendation from HP?

"Well, the VA ain't supported anymore as it is EOL (now that we bought Compaq and they are better with medium sized Storage than we are). We can cut you a deal on it though!".

Yeah, great service, really.

Don't get me started on the XP512, it's basically a Hitchachi array with HP Logo and Firmware. It is beyond me why anybody would buy this (politics of course) as the only place you can get support from is HP. If you buy the Sun Array though (also Hitachi) it is Hitachi through and through and at least you can get support from several different vendors.

So no, my experience with HP support isn't all that glorious.


perhaps these things just don't happen in europe? i never saw a sun engineer that had to fly over some part from i don't know where. these guys get stuck in trafic jams and sometimes screw up the outage window.

Last time I checked Toronto was in Canada, not in Europe. You know, the thing on top of the USA?

Relaxing? I suppose, but I find the sound just sdfkl;zzzzzzzzzz...

One quarter of Canada's population lives within a 160 kilometre (100-mile) radius of Toronto.

The conclusion: Canada is big, but it's got a few relatively small highly populated areas and a whole lot of very sparsely populated territory between. Thus, serving most of the people with broadband is a lot easier and cheaper than in the USA.

The Ontario EDCO newsletter had a list of transit systems using smart cards (issue dated February,2000).

Hehe, you may get tired of gross inaccuracies being spouted wildly by idiot americans about Canada, but I get just as tired of people using CanAda of an example of how the US should be run when it has a population that is slightly more than 1 tenth the population of the US. Each country is unique. Each country has issues it must work on. You can't assume that what works in one will work in the other.

The latest data I could find on Canda's population is from the 1996 Canadian Census listing which states that there are 28,846,761 people living in the country. I belive current estimates put Canada at 31 million and the US at 270 million. My remark about population size and distribution and implementing "programs" (whether it be power distribution or internet) still holds. Most of the population is clustered around major cities (as with most countries, the US included) and the smaller sized population allows large public works to be slightly more effective at reaching the majority of the population. That's an oversimplification of course as there are political and social factors as well, but the population size and distribution does play a major role.

NYC consumes a lot more power than you might think, but yeah, I was making a gross exaggeration and being abnoxiously sarcastic. My apologies both for not making that clear and for any percieved insult.

In the interest of clearing the air here are the actual stats for the relevant areas. I can't find the numbers for the city itself, but New York State consumes approximately 4.28 trillion BTUs (1.26 billion kWh unless I totally screwed the conversion up) of power a year (according to 1999 DOE data) and Canda consumes 551 billion kWh per year (according to 1998 data). The US as a whole consumes 3.36 trillion kWh. So yeah, slight exaggeration. :P

Then again so was your estimation of the size of Toronto.

According to the City of Toronto's facts guide, the city has a population of 2.48 million people. What it is has that is big is government. The same site boasts that Tornoto has, "5th largest municipal government in North America."

Here is the top 10 (including Mexico) in North America:

Pouplation (in millions)
1.) New York USA 20.2
2.) Mexico City Mexico 19.8
3.) Los Angeles USA 16.2
4.) Chicago USA 8.9
5.) Washington D.C. USA 7.5
6.) San Francisco USA 6.9
7.) Philidelphia USA 6.1
8.) Boston USA 5.7
9.) Detroit USA 5.4
10.)Dallas USA 5.1

And for the sake of completeness the world:

1.) Tokyo, Japan 28
2.) New York City, United States 20.1
3.) Mexico City, Mexico 19.8
4.) Bombay, India 18
5.) Sao Paulo, Brazil 17.7
6.) Los Angeles, United States 16.2
7.) Shanghai, China 14.2
8.) Lagos, Nigeria 13.5
9.) Calcutta, India 12.9
10.) Buenos Aires, Argentina 12.5

Now if you'll excuse me, I'm off to follow that Lost Rivers link. If I'm not back in a while, don't bother. Gollum!

The Toronto Public Library offers a similar service to read a selection of eBooks online.

Even better, they also loan Rocket eBook readers!

The Toronto Public Library offers a similar service to read a selection of eBooks online.

Even better, they also loan Rocket eBook readers!

The Toronto Public Library offers a similar service to read a selection of eBooks online.

Even better, they also loan Rocket eBook readers!

Toronto has a couple of closed subway stations and partial lines under the Queen and Bay stations that were never put into service. They are now used exclusively for training TTC subway employees and filming movies.

The subway scenes for the Mira Sorvino film Mimic (1997) were shot there, as were scenes from Johnny Mnemonic and Darkman, among others.

Toronto has a couple of closed subway stations and partial lines under the Queen and Bay stations that were never put into service. They are now used exclusively for training TTC subway employees and filming movies.

The subway scenes for the Mira Sorvino film Mimic (1997) were shot there, as were scenes from Johnny Mnemonic and Darkman, among others.

The TTC has a number of abandoned stations and facilities. http://www.transit.toronto.on.ca/transit.cfm?tt=su bway&id=5006

The most commonly known abandoned station is Lower Bay, the lower level of the Bay station. It was used for a few months when the Bloor-Danforth line first opened, to allow the trains to interline with the Yonge-University line.

When the Yonge line was planned, it was thought that a streetcar subway would run under Queen Street (rather than the Bloor-Danforth line we have today). A roughed-in platform was built for the streetcars under Queen Station. At Osgoode (Queen St, University line), there is no second platform, although utlities were moved to accomodate a line (should it be built).

Another abandoned "station" is located at Allen Road, along the cancelled Eglinton line. The station was the first to be built, but the new government at the time cancelled the line and the station was filled in. Work never progressed far enough for it to be called a station though.

Keele and Woodbine stations on the Bloor line were terminal stations when the Bloor-Danforth line first opened. Special tunnels were built to make it easier for passengers to transfer to/from the streetcars, but were later abandoned.

The TTC has a number of abandoned stations and facilities. http://www.transit.toronto.on.ca/transit.cfm?tt=su bway&id=5006

The most commonly known abandoned station is Lower Bay, the lower level of the Bay station. It was used for a few months when the Bloor-Danforth line first opened, to allow the trains to interline with the Yonge-University line.

When the Yonge line was planned, it was thought that a streetcar subway would run under Queen Street (rather than the Bloor-Danforth line we have today). A roughed-in platform was built for the streetcars under Queen Station. At Osgoode (Queen St, University line), there is no second platform, although utlities were moved to accomodate a line (should it be built).

Another abandoned "station" is located at Allen Road, along the cancelled Eglinton line. The station was the first to be built, but the new government at the time cancelled the line and the station was filled in. Work never progressed far enough for it to be called a station though.

Keele and Woodbine stations on the Bloor line were terminal stations when the Bloor-Danforth line first opened. Special tunnels were built to make it easier for passengers to transfer to/from the streetcars, but were later abandoned.

Lillian H. Smith branch 239 College Street Toronto, Ontario M5T 1R5 416-393-7746.

A similar donation was made in 1970 by Judith Merril to the Toronto Public Library. It's a reference library so they don't lend books(bastards).

A contemporary of Asimov, Leiber, Pohl and others she donated around 5000 items. The collection is now about 57000 items; Novels, Anthologies, Essays and more. What's really neat about the whole thing is that it's housed in a standard Toronto public library and anyone can use their services.

anyway...
J:)

Er, which capital city are you thinking of?

There isn't even a city where the G8 is officially being held (Kananaskis) and Calgary is neither a federal nor a provincial capital.

Toronto, is not Canada's capital either.

Ottawa holds that dubious honour. Toronto just thinks it's the captial of Canada and, of course, many people around the world get fooled.

For good time, you can always check what our southern neighbours think about us.

Erm.. surely you don't think countries like Canada and Australia which are underpopulated should go for a one child policy?

Well, actually, I do. See my .sig, I (hopefully obviously) live in Canada.

The question is more complex than 'region x has a low pop. density vs. region y; no control for y; control for x."

Nature has no political borders. Those silly lines drawn on maps t define 'us' and 'them' do not exist in reality. I, as a citizen of the planet am just as responsible for population control as anyone. Now, do we get a 'bigger' bang for our 'buck' if we try and curb population in areas of already high density? yes. But *I* am responsible to aid in this effort just as much - solidarity if you will is absolutely necessary.

The idea of strict population control will not 'take' well in the West. With the USofA completely sucked into 'the individual is king' mind-set (no ability to think/act as a community) you will not see many able to accept responsibility (see Oprah Winfry's guests for example). Americans (and increasingly the rest of the 'West') are convinced they are beautiful unique and precious, the world would be devastated without them. In some more enlightened places people recognize their lives are co-dependant and intermingled. Bottom Line: Westerners are selfish.

What do Westerner's inability to accept community responsibility have to do with population control? Well, it is of particular importance considering the level of destruction we are responsible for. Please, i seriously invite everyone to gauge this reality: City of Toronto's Footprint Calculator

don't have the economic capacity to feed themselves

Since when could you feed yourself with "economy"? Really, by your reasoning, there will always be hungry, just as there are always going to be 'poor' - if you rely on Capitalism...

I don't see it as particularly inovative. Good transport systems already have a mesh, for example Toronto's, where every major street has a subway, streetcar or bus route, and you can switch from one to the other wherever they intersect.

I've got one of those Intellimouse Explorers (the huge silver ones with the superfluous tail light and like three extra buttons; well, what the hell, here's a http://www.microsoft.com/Mouse/explorer.htm link) and sites that won't let you back out are an incredible annoyance. See, two of the buttons on there serve as Forward/Back (respectively) while browsing the web, and after about 20 minutes of using them, I was hooked. You wouldn't believe how simple (and remarkably intuitive) to navigate with your thumb. Now if I could just find a good use for those buttons in Half-Life... I mean, sure, it's easy enough to hold down the back button and select the page before the offending site, but that would require moving my cursor over six or so linear inches of desktop space. Isn't that just a little bit unreasonable? No? Ah well.

• Clean streets and subways
  
• Great value for the US dollar
  
• Government-funded health care system
  
• The UN just ranked Canada the best place to live for the 7th year in a row
  
• Low crime rate, safe streets (Chicago has about the same population and land area and has around 1000 murders a year compared to Toronto's 75 or so on a bad year.)

I have several dear friends who are crippled by either depression or by the anti-depression drugs they take. But as far as I can tell, their misery is mostly through having been convinced by the medical establishment that there is no hope for them except for drugs. One said "I've only got a few more kinds of drugs left before they put me on electroshock." How can depression be an accurate diagnosis if none of the treatments work?
So much wasted potential. This system perpetrates crimes without the slightest concern for its victims - those who live near the edge.

Anyway, I wanted to say this in the pinkerton article comments - what students should be doing is pressing charges of assault. There is no way they can lose these cases (except maybe the first few... which is an awful thought), and if enough people start dragging it into court, the schools will recognize that this culture of tolerated violence is badly fucked.

I'm still suprised I managed to get away with things like leaping on the principal from a high-up window well, or singing loudly during math class... but then again, Canada is "more enlightened"... for now.

*Nick Wolfe
I am weeping because this stupid planet sucks.
AT LEAST THEY'RE NOT STILL LOBOTOMIZING US.