L E T   'E R    R I P !!!

Sure seems to have been a long.....cold.....winter. Spring and warm temperatures can come anytime soon. I don't have anything else really to whine about this morning

Heads up folks... Greenpeace is taking aim at the pulp industry again... to quote them...
"People just don't understand that softness equals ecological destruction."

http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2009/feb/26/toilet-roll-america

Its a real bummer...lol.

Could we tune down all the animated ads on the Opinion 250 site? There is so much stuff jumping around on all sides of the news articles now it's distracting. One or two animated ads would be ok, but have the rest static. Right now there are at least 8 of them with moving bits. Thanks!

Here's a news that might cheer you up a little.

http://www.newsweek.com/id/183670?from=rss

hartbooks... If you don't like the excitement go and buy a CITIZEN newspaper and read yesterdays news. Advertising is what pays for this "FREE" blog. Don't try to ruin it.

Wow, what about the poor couple that the RCMP did not send out a search out for. Watching your wife die, that is horrible.

I'm sure there will be no reprecussion AGAIN on this.

It's true though, this site is more ads than content. Wonderful content though, with very intelligent, insightful comments! Happy Friday.

People just don't understand, softness, means a better toilet paper.

Shut down the pulpmills, what are we suppose to use.

How about council tries to save money rather than think of news ways to spend our money!!!

Last I noticed, SOS means save our souls or HELP! Surly it can't take that much imagination to go out and investigate the SOS on site right away. Hello knock knock any lights on.

He speaks."Shut down the pulpmills,what are we suppose to use."....Maybe they want us to save a tree and wipe our arse on a spotted owl.

As long as its not an eagle....

Notice the issues cops are having, Houston, Vanderhoof, Williams Lake, Vancouver Airport and others involve inexperienced cops. So what kind of training are these people getting? It seems to me all they are getting is reruns of cop shows as that is how they seem to be acting.

I believe these cops may have a case for a lawsuit related to poor training. It also might be some attitude they are given during training. Training seems to be the common denominator.

I think they'll have a tough time getting any traction with this protest....

Hey everyone happy friday!! The end of February and we're seeing -25 temperatures? Come on Spring!!

I agree with He speaks yet another RCMP oops, I don't get it they go to school to learn how to be a cop right?? I mean its gotta be more than riding the horsies with the pretty red coat on..come on!! A person is dead and we hear "oops, we won't do that again". I tell you, the more I hear about stuff like this with the RCMP the more I don't want anything to do with the police, for my own safety. I rememer when I was a kid the Mounties were someone you looked up to and admired. Now? I see that changing, and its not the officers fault they are just following orders, The whole trickle down thing, if theres no trickle at the top then you have nothing at the bottom.
I was a little dissapointed to see the Gordon Cambell photo shoot in the free press yesterday, at the airport. Do you think you guys could've put a plane in the background? I can't tell the difference from the begining of the project photo and the end photo, its Mr. Campbell and the local boys (and girl) in front of a flat field with nothing in the background. They could as easily be opening a hay field. I think for all the uproar they put into it, it seemed to be a little less than expected for opening one of the longest runways in Canada. I mean I think the "if you buld it they will come" idea is valid, companies will use it because its there, maybe not right away but it'll come. I guess I was lookig for a little more fanfare, free hotdogs and a big cake shaped like an airplane, balloons for the kids, free trips to vancouver haha..just kidding, my point is if we're going to do something great in PG we're going to have to create some excitement over it.

Thanks Opinion 250 for letting me vent, leave the advertisements as they are I like em, have a great weekend everyone, see you next week.

Seamutt, I think you let the guilty ones off easy. If you're going to use correlation as causation... then I would says its accountability or lack of it that is the problem. When you know you're not going to be held to account.. and it feel really powerful to pull the trigger an extra few times....

I think we need a provincial police force with local expertise and civilian oversight so that accountability has a more direct flow chart.

Opps mistake... what I meant to say was the guy in the tazer case at Vancouver airport pulling the trigger 4 more times once his man was down was obviously because he had no regard for the consequences of his actions... not necessarily training.

Considering that:
(1) We live in the middle of a huge foresst Industry.

(2) We take trips around the world to sell the use of lumber in building.

(3) Many mills in this area are closed due to the downturn in the lumber market.

(4) Our Politicians are always talking about the importance of the Lumber Industry.

Then why::::

Is the new PGSS High School presently being built with METAL STUDS????

This is a BC Government project, being built with BC Taxpayers dollars, in the middle of one of the largest stud manufacturing areas in the world, and we use metal.

This is not the only building in this town where metal studs have been used, there are many more.

Seems like the Politicians only pay lip service to the use of local lumber.

How do we get others to use our product when we dont use it ourselves???

WOW. Did anyone see the black smoke belching from the pellet plant Thursday morning. It might have something to do with the high PM 10 numbers in College Heights yesterday or was that an instrument error.
The MOE needs to reign in these pellet plant people and force them to decrease emissions and to improve burner combustion control. Wonder if the wet ESP is on order yet?

To Seamutt; HELLO; can you read the signs that say out of bounds-danger-do not enter-abandon all hope ye who enter here; you get the idea?
-should not have gone out of bounds
-should have left word as to destination
-should have stayed put after realizing that they were lost, or at least after stomping out S.O.S. in the snow. If they had not kept wandering around, they would probably have been found after the first S.O.S. My sympathy to the husband, but they did everything wrong.
metalman.

"Why is the new PGSS High School presently being built with METAL STUDS????"

Palopu. Do yourself a flavour. Go to the library and find a copy of the BC bulding code. Look up Assembly Building (group A) an look at school structure requirements for that size of school. It will say that it shall be of non-combustible construction. Then look under the part dealing with the description of non combustible construction and read that 2x4 partitions are considered to be combusitible and are, therefore, not allowed.

Take you beef or wood to the Minister repsonsible for the BC Building Code see whether he will want to change the next version of it. That section is based on the national building code and the 4 or so regional building codes in the USA are all very similar.

Thanks for the information Gus. That certainly clears the matter up. Seems we are cutting off our noses to spite our faces.

It seems rather strange to me that the Senior Citizens home on 20th and Victoria which is a huge complex that will house people who are much more a risk, was built (to the best of my knowledge) with wooden studs. Seems we have different sets of rules for different buildings.

I know that ads pay for this site giterdun, but the scrolling movement on so many of them at the same time makes it hard to actually read the blog content.

What I'm suggesting is only having a couple of ads at a time with movement, and have the rest of the ads be non-moving.

Geesh, didn't think that by posting an opinion or suggestion I was trying to ruin the site.

You are probably right on that one Palopu if it was built with wood studs.

Building can be compartmentalized to reduce the actual size of the "building". The Buidling Code definition of "building" includes compartmentalization. One of the most common places to see that in effect is in the "fire doors" located in the corridors of larger (longer) apartment complexes. The building complex on 20th and Victoria is likely compartmentalized, or it uses steel studs and "heavy timber".

There are many ways to stretch the total area allowed. Sprinklering a building is one way of doing it. But eventually one hits a limit and one has to change the basic construction material.

Also remember that to do all these other things just to use wood studs makes the construction more expensive. Thus, using wood comes at a $ cost contrary to what intuition might tell you.

One simply cannot get around the scientific fact that wood adds to he fire load in case of fire. There are researchers at UBC working on such issues, as they have been for decades, to make sure that wood gets a fair shake at access as a building material in buildings without compromising building asset.

The latest result of that is the use of wood in 6 storey residential buildings, both from a structural and a fire safety point of view. Don't know enough about the actual changes to comment on the effect on cost - reduced cost, same, or increased.

Betcha, however, that those who keep control of carbon reduction will say it will get carbon credits when compared to concrete or steel construction.

Well, why are they using steel studs. Its because the crap they sell for the local market should be used for boat building. they are twisted and have too much wane in them.

It is quicker to use steel studs then to use wood studs. Steel studs cost more, but your not having to take the twist out of the crap they sell locally.

Give us consistant quality of lumber, less than 3% of the lumber with twisting and warping problems, less than 5% of the edges have wanes. Than we commercial contractors will consider the wood alternatives.

If we were to be the leaders in wood technology. shouldn't we have a OSB plant in town, Shouldn't we have a plywood plant in town. Why can't we have a plant to make microlam and paralam. Why can't we have a glulam plant.

It is one thing to say we should have a woody tech lab. but lets see government and industry put there money where there mouth is and start building a industry that produces product of wood technology. Instead of lip service, and trying to reinvent a 2x4. Maybe they will come up with the idea that a 1.375 by 3.5 inches will be good,

Gus, you are right with the building code issue.

Papolu, you are right, different building use has different building codes!

It kind of sucks being the people looking after the RCMP continuing oops. Its easy for us plain old boring tax payers to say do this do that. But the people that reprimand the their own people, have to take in the consideration of not undermining the RCMP credential too much so that the masses fail to respect them. Thus then they can no longer have the advantage of power.

The only possible solution is for the RCMP to look at themselves, and decide if they are good enough to be the pillars of the community. The Federal Government has to lay down the gauntlet and get them to be more accountable for policing themselves. The RCMP members in turn has to become a bit more emersed into the community, instead of running around in packs on there time off. This is the key to the success of the RCMP for this century.

Good point of view he speaks. If we can send sawn lumber from here, there is no reason I am aware of that would prevent us from manufacturing and sending parallam products from here.

You guys have great knowledge of the building code but maybe you should find out what school they are building? The new Duchess Park Secondary school not PGSS.

Also lets go over this again as in grade 2 ... The first thing we do when we are going on an out of bounds ski trip????.. Tell someone where you are going and when you are expected back!!

metalman HELLO it was an SOS that was not investigated on site in a timely matter. Hey I went snowmobiling up the Murrey range, was I out of bounds. Yes I agree they should have left information behind.

HELLO Seamutt, I am aware of the SOS issue in this case, thanks. There is definitely a problem in that the reports allegedly went unheeded, my point is that the survivor, or some do gooder, should not try to make a case of the fact that no one did anything about the reports of an SOS sighting. It almost sounds like some folks are on the verge of making a case, but if they did, and if they won their case, it would set a dangerous precedent. It could lead some people to assume that there will always be someone watching their backtrail and looking for them. Kind of like encouraging people to behave irresponsibly since there will always be a bail out.
No offense intended.
metalman.

HeSpeaks, you are full of it. You don't have a clue. Many RCMP members in many towns and cities are very involved in their respective communities. They coach, they are referees or umpires,play recreational sports, take part in community events..etc. They are involved.

Apart from what you small minded people think, many police officers weren't born with a gun on their hips.

He speaks:"If we were to be the leaders in wood technology. shouldn't we have a OSB plant in town, Shouldn't we have a plywood plant in town. Why can't we have a plant to make microlam and paralam. Why can't we have a glulam plant."

Isn't the air polluted enough already?

Seamutt I agree with you on this one.

For no one,(especially the RCMP or SAR) to have followed up on a reported sighting of an SOS is a crime and should be treated as such.

It makes no difference in this case or any other why these people were in the predicament that they were.

The only issue is the fact that some people did not do the job they were trained to do.

Just exactly what the hell do these people think an SOS is for???

Complete incompetence!

What ever happened to the motto... to serve and protect???

You're all fired!

May 12, 2009 BC will head to the polls faced with the reality that BC is in recession. Election and recession together means things are going to get nasty in the political realm. During this run up we will be reminded about the bad old days when the NDP were last in power. However now that we can compare both political parties to similar terms in office, we find there is little truth to the Liberals smear campaigning.

The average rate of economic growth under the Liberals has been 2.6%, compared to the NDP during the so called “lost decade” was 2.8%.

The Employment gains went to the top earners in the province.

Employment during the NDP grew by 22%, under the Liberals 20%, but an additional 35,000 jobs lost in January and by Election Day it could very well be more jobs were created under the NDP than the Liberals


My point here is not a partisan one –Rather, it is to remind people that BC’s economic fortunes generally swing on decisions made outside our borders. Politicians will inevitably try to take claim credit when times are good, and just as quickly will shift blame onto others when times get bad.

BC is in a recession that is getting worse each week, and the Premier is once again getting bit in the backside by his own penchant for populism, as BC’s fixed election date guarantees two and a half more months of bad economic news in the press in the lead-up to the next election.
So we can expect a rugged and ugly election season, with a lot of finger-pointing and name-calling. That is a shame because now more than ever British Columbians need a real democratic debate about where the province is headed.

Just Install "ADBLOCK" in Firefox makes for a very quit Screen, or ADBLOCK PLUS in LINUX Debian Browser"ICEWEASEL" works for me.

Aren't those PACHA people great?

I know the RCMP are messing up in a couple of areas right now but our fellows here do the cancer run each year on their bikes as they head off to Prince Rupert. Above and beyond I think.

Bond said, "That is a shame because now more than ever British Columbians need a real democratic debate about where the province is headed."
One would HOPE for a real democratic debate in an election campaign. However I believe that the issues will be glossed over and the BC Libs will say look at the 90's, completely disregarding their record in office where they have sold out the province, mostly in secret.

Correlation time , folks. Given that the Quebec Pension Plan "lost" 25% of their money, it kinda puts a squeeze on them. If the same or worse should happen to our Canada Pension Plan, isn't it nice to know where the better part of our seniors (law abiding of course) who own guns live? Let's hear it for our gun registry.If the pension plan takes a bath, maybe our government can just print more money. Not like Zimbabwe though.

Well you know Harbinger....

Most all of the 25% Quebec pension plan loses were derivative related... ditto for like $60 million of Canfor's loses last quarter.... I say if you're going to slay the dragon it starts or ends with the derivative market. Otherwise we all bail out the banksters for quatrillions and join the third world in our purchasing power as vassal debt slaves. I read the other day that even if you made the going inflation rate on your investments over the last decade you still lost two thirds of your purchasing power for those same dollars.... The next month could be horrendous for people that thought they could retire IMO.... I think its all perfectly planned. We're entering the era of funny money so the NWO globalists can come and save us... and we have no back-up plan.

Time Will Tell