Archives for Projects for Year 2010

The Greenhouse Action Tool Kit

This workshop was facilitated by the www.frankplans.com group based in Cochrane, Alberta.  The Frank Plans team will be facilitating workshops in 11 Alberta municipalities.  The objective of the project is to create a leading-edge, user-friendly Toolkit for Alberta municipalities on reducing community greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions at the local level.

Through the development of this Toolkit, it is hoped that a community of practice in the province will emerge to enable constant learning and innovation amongst municipalities across Alberta. The Toolkit will be available January 2012.  

Modern Roundabouts 

March 16, 2010 - at Canmore Town Council’s business meeting in the Civic Centre, the Bow Valley Clean Air Society made a presentation about the feasibility of installing road junctions called modern roundabouts.    

In comparison to traffic lights, these road junctions cost less, reduce accidents, reduce engine idling and pollution and act as a calming device.  See article in the Rocky Mountain Outlook newspaper about this presentation.

June 18, 2010 - BVCAS met with the Town of Canmore's Engineering to further discuss the issue of roundabouts.  Town Engineering assured us they are in favor of "modern roundbouts" and will install them where it is feasible.  See BVCAS's document which we gave to Canmore's Engineering.

Sept. 28, 2011 - The petition for modern roundabouts has been rescheduled for March & April 2012.  We encourage everybody to talk about Modern Roundabouts as much as possible through the summer to get feedback as to how many people would sign the petition.

A small committee will be formed beginning in January, 2012 to assist Ken Blackwood, the Project Leader. 

 At our September monthly meeting, it was decided to postpone the collection of names, for the petition, from this fall to March and April next year.  In February of 2012, we will have a communication blitz to the public.  A small committee will be set up by January 2012 to help Ken Blackwood, (Project Leader) with the planning of this project (If anyone is willing to help Ken with the planning, please give him a call at (403) 678-2423)

A "Modern Roundabout" is a road junction where traffic must travel anticlockwise in a single lane around a central island and give way to the left, ie traffic already on the roundabout.

Composting

January 24/11 - As a result of the survey obtained at the public meeting in May of last year, BVCAS sent a letter to Canmore Council asking them to move ahead with a"composting kitchen waste initiative" (both commercial and private) for the town of Canmore and to put the issue forefront on their agenda for 2011.

Presently, the Municipality of Bighorn is working with the University of Calgary to design such a program. In their letter to Canmore Council, BVCAS asked Canmore Council to collaborate with the MD to implement this very necessary program in order to avoid unnecessary repetition of a study and to combine resources.

This issue has been debated previously both at Council and among citizens and we are all aware of the how the benefits of an efficient composting program far out-weigh the 'quick fix' solution of, 'put it into the landfill', presently in place.

June 5, 2011 - Our Education Chairperson, Karen Kunelius wrote a letter to the Editor, the most recent one in the Rocky Mountain Outlook titled - “Put composting at forefront of waste study” (can be viewed here) http://www.rmoutlook.com/article/20110609/RMO0904/306099992/-1/rmo09/put-composting-at-forefront-of-waste-study/