Ah, potholes.
Another week, another editorial.
It's simply the topic that keeps giving.
An opportunity to write about potholes springs up as often and as suddenly as new potholes appear on 15th Avenue.
Potholes on 15th Avenue are like clover on a neglected patch of grass. At what point is it no longer lawn? At what point is it no longer road but just straight pothole? Shouldn't the signs be changed? Just hang a right at 15th Pothole?
See, now that's potentially misleading.
The 15th pothole from where?
The 15th pothole, counting forward or backward, from Central heading west or east? The 15th pothole, using integers or square roots, from Ospika heading west or east?
Regardless, biologists have now shown a clear connection between potholes and the mountain pine beetle. The timing can't be ignored. As soon as the pine beetle infestation turned up, so did the pothole plague.
The many similarities are shocking:
n able to survive cold temperatures
n mild winters just help them spread further and faster
n incredible reproductive rates
n can't be killed with any known natural or manmade solution
n creative residents make suggestions to turn the crisis into solutions
Work continues on whether this is a causal relationship, but early data suggests Dan Rogers might be the culprit.
On the pine beetle front, some industrious folks began marketing "denim wood," since beetle-infested wood has a telltale blue streak left behind in it. A clever concept, not to be confused with the blue streak left behind when drivers hit a particularly deep pothole at high speed on the aforementioned 15th Avenue.
This kind of synergy requires dramatic and immediate action by various powerful players in the pothole saga, working together to ensure pothole sustainability.
Memo to Aidan Kelly, CEO, Tourism Prince George:
Introduce new marketing campaign for 2013. Drop the moose, the trees and the building from the logo. Replace with picture of a big hole in crumbling pavement with one of the following slogans: ; "the hole of the north is right here"; "Grand Canyon North"; "shake, rattle and hole" or "if you like it rough, give us a call."
Memo to Heather Oland, CEO, Initiatives Prince George:
Immediately book meetings on Howe Street in Vancouver with mining companies. Reframe Prince George as mining capital of Canada. Explain origin of the word pothole as coming from the Middle English, in regards to a geological feature seen in glaciers and then in reference to open-pit mining. No need for expensive drilling - just build a road on it and introduce it to Prince George drivers.
Memo to Mick Jones, city streets operations supervisor, City of Prince George:
Hey, weren't you the guitarist in Foreigner? Never mind. Anyhoo, it'll take more than one Python to fill the holes in city streets but you are to be commended for your initiative. Congratulations. You've just been promoted to city manager. You start Monday.
Memo to Dr. George Iwama, president, University of Northern British Columbia:
Please install a Canada Research Chair in Pothole Ecology. Host global symposiums and invite leading academics, with provocative titles like: "Potholes, Patriarchy and Modern Radical Feminist Discourse"; "Genesis of Ampulla Lacuna (Common Pothole) On South-Facing Slopes In Dissected Flood Plains"; and "Aerial-Based Inventory Methodology for Assessing Linear Potholes Altered By Socio-Political Rhetoric."
The opportunities are endless for collaboration.
Why not use a horizontal pothole as the venue for the snowboarding halfpipe competition at the 2015 Canada Winter Games?
Forget, we are winter.
We Are Potholes.
Pothole George or Metpotholis?
Nice ring to both of them, although Ampulla Lacuna makes it sound more exotic.
California can have L.A. - we'd be A.L.
