Finally Spring has arrived! The transformation of walking is so welcome. I can now walk longer time and distance without bundling up or dodging around ice-patches or leaping over snow-banks. No need to bundle my dogs up either.
In walking around my town (Renfrew, Ontario, pop. 7,500) I have been distressed by the awful condition of the roads and sidewalks. You can’t even say that walkers are disadvantaged because of cars, because the roads are every bit in disrepair as the sidewalks. One of my maintenance walks takes me out to a new housing development, appended to the back of one of the major shopping malls. With all the talk about accessible communities and the importance of public walking space, I am shocked to see this set of about 50 new dwellings completely ignores sidewalks. There a few lay-bys which run for parts of blocks, but these are clearly intended as off-street parking concessions.
On the other hand, I do have to congratulate some parts of the community which managed to acquire a multi-million dollar grant for the maintenance of the K and P Trail, a local snowmobile track favoured by walkers in the summer. The K and P is one of our best kept walking secrets and this money promises to keep it in top shape for years. I don’t often thank politicians for much, but in this case, a tip o’ the ball-cap is in order.
see you out walking,
Ray
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