[URBAN NOTE] Winter's toll
Mar. 2nd, 2007 09:02 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
rfmcdonaldIt started with the weather: not cold but precipitation-heavy, coming down as snow and sleet and melting and freezing. It became worse thanks to an unfortunate accident at the intersection of Brock Road and Highway 401 in Pickering, the first city found to the east of Toronto.
I wasn't commuting as such--the TTC's buses along Dupont Street were too irregular, and the GO train is quite irrelevant to my transit needs. All that I was doing was walking along Dupont, watching the thick ropes of cars inch their way along the streets, getting bunched up at intersections.
Not that I could claim superiority: I hadn't expected so much snow to come down, and it was cold. "It's cold," a matronly old woman told me as I passed the Ossington shelter, "you need gloves."
Toronto's still recovering, not least because of today's warm temperatures. What happens to molten dihydrogen oxide? It runs, everywhere.
A CN freight train derailed in Pickering just before 11 a.m., sending 32 cars off the track. No one was hurt and there were no chemical leaks, but the derailment forced GO Transit to shut down part of its Lakeshore East service.
Trains are operating from Union station to Pickering, and limited shuttle bus service will be available between Pickering and Oshawa, the company said on its website. Delays are expected, including on the Lakeshore West service.
Meanwhile, a freezing rain warning is in effect for the GTA. Ice pellets and heavy rains are forecast to follow the snow that hit the region shortly after noon and continues at this hour. As of mid-afternoon, fewer than 50 vehicle crashes had been reported on roads outside the city, but the Ontario Provincial Police were expecting many more.
"The entire GTA is now enveloped in snow and it's covering right off into eastern Ontario. It's heavy at times," he said.
I wasn't commuting as such--the TTC's buses along Dupont Street were too irregular, and the GO train is quite irrelevant to my transit needs. All that I was doing was walking along Dupont, watching the thick ropes of cars inch their way along the streets, getting bunched up at intersections.
Not that I could claim superiority: I hadn't expected so much snow to come down, and it was cold. "It's cold," a matronly old woman told me as I passed the Ossington shelter, "you need gloves."
Toronto's still recovering, not least because of today's warm temperatures. What happens to molten dihydrogen oxide? It runs, everywhere.
