Pre Xmas Skiing on Mont Royal
Present: H.S. Tibbs & A.T. Lane
On a very cold, yet not very snow covered day before Christmas the two members made a rather half-hearted attempt at cross country skiing on Mont Royal. They afterwards retired to Smith House and made a whole-hearted effort towards solving the world's problems over coffee.
Again poppies came up as a topic of conversation, it was resolved that since this is a Bicycle Blog no attempt shall be made to discuss the relative merits of red vs white poppies. Instead poppy discussions will be framed by the club within the context of the high number of automobile related deaths and how they should be remembered.
Quick comparative numbers.
1. More Americans killed by automobiles since 2000 than both world wars.
2. Despite some improvement in recent years, automotive deaths still outnumber the extraordinary number of gun related deaths in the US.
On a very cold, yet not very snow covered day before Christmas the two members made a rather half-hearted attempt at cross country skiing on Mont Royal. They afterwards retired to Smith House and made a whole-hearted effort towards solving the world's problems over coffee.
Again poppies came up as a topic of conversation, it was resolved that since this is a Bicycle Blog no attempt shall be made to discuss the relative merits of red vs white poppies. Instead poppy discussions will be framed by the club within the context of the high number of automobile related deaths and how they should be remembered.
Quick comparative numbers.
1. More Americans killed by automobiles since 2000 than both world wars.
2. Despite some improvement in recent years, automotive deaths still outnumber the extraordinary number of gun related deaths in the US.
That's a sobering conversation for a cold day on the mountain! Here's a remarkable statistic on the road death trend in Quebec. There were over 2,200 motor vehicle deaths on Quebec roads in 1973. 45 years later, that number had dropped to 359!! I wonder who should get the credit? Vehicle manufacturers? Road design engineers? Insurance companies? Safety advocates? Policy makers? Warmer winters? Snow tire laws? Maybe all of the above. Similar thinking needs to be applied to pedestrian and cyclist safety.
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