Category: Direct Action

IllegalSigns.ca Helps Toronto Win Right to Remove Billboards

We’ve followed the hard work of IllegaSigns.ca before and now they’ve helped Toronto city council win a case in court against billboards companies. The Ontario Supreme Court ruled that Toronto has the right to take down illegal billboards primarily because there is a large public outcry. This is a far cry from banning billboards (like in Sao Paulo), but this a huge step for Toronto.

From IllegalSigns.ca:

Because Strategic Media’s case against the City was brought for the purpose of delay — so they can earn revenue from their illegal billboards while their frivolous case drags through the courts — this represents a complete victory for Toronto.

Here are some highlights of the decision, which basically proves that being a pest really pays off:

  • “The City has been inundated with complaints since 2006 from a public interest group regarding the proliferation of signs in Toronto’s downtown core. Moreover, in the process of harmonizing the various sign by-laws, the City received public input to the effect that there are too many signs and regulation of the City’s streetscape is inadequate. Thus, the City argues, there is evidence of actual public interest in this issue and harm to that interest if the injunction is granted.” Paragraph 33
  • “While I can assume that the public interest favours compliance with the existing sign by-laws, there is also evidence of specific public interest in this case in the form of the complaints by a public interest group and the comments obtained by the City in the process of harmonizing its sign by-laws.” Paragraph 40

101 Ways to Make the World Better

Here’s a nice list of 101 ways to improve your world, some of the ideas are really nice and simple while others are bit more extreme.

From the 30s:

31. Make breakfast in bed for someone you love.

32. Find something you’re good at and use it to help someone else.

33. Learn a new language, then volunteer as an interpreter.

34. Know someone who is sad and single? Find someone to hook them up with!

35. Bring coffee or baked goods to city workers who might appreciate it.

36. Help someone with a heavy load.

Conserving Energy Starts at Home

It goes without saying that saving energy is a good thing, and it’s something that everyone can do. It’s really easy to save energy and sometimes it’s easy to forget how easy it is, luckily the internet is filled with tips on how to save energy at home.

2. Make sure that the rooms in the house are neither too cold nor too warm.
Heating and cooling systems takes up most of the energy which is being consumed by a typical household. By making sure that each individual room in the house has just the right temperature, you will be saving a lot on CO2 emissions.
3. Make sure that the air filters are cleaned and the heaters are well-insulated.
Again, heating and cooling takes up most of the energy consumption in a typical home. When you see to it that your air filters are cleaned or replaced regularly, the energy will not be lost. Dirty air filters need to work doubly hard and take twice as much energy to work properly.
The same thing applies when you make sure that the heaters are well-insulated – it’s a good way to observe that no heat is escaping and you’re not using any more energy than you have to.

Creating a Bike-Friendly Sustainable Society in the USA

The New York Times has an article about a Oregon congressman who has been promoting bicycling and sustainable living for 20 years. The article goes into his hard work and how what he has been promoting has become really popular.

But Mr. Blumenauer’s goals are larger than putting Americans on two wheels. He seeks to create what he calls a more sustainable society, including wiser use of energy, farming that improves the land rather than degrades it, an end to taxpayer subsidies for unwise development — and a transportation infrastructure that looks beyond the car.

For him, the global financial collapse is “perhaps the best opportunity we will ever see” to build environmental sustainability into the nation’s infrastructure, with urban streetcar systems, bike and pedestrian paths, more efficient energy transmission and conversion of the federal government’s 600,000-vehicle fleet to use alternate fuels.

“These are things that three years ago were unimaginable,” he said. “And if they were imaginable, we could not afford them. Well, now when all the experts agree that we will be lucky if we stabilize the economy in a couple of years, when there is great concern about the consequences of the collapse of the domestic auto producers, gee, these are things that are actually reasonable and affordable.”