Jonathan Fowlie
Sun

LOWER MAINLAND I Who knew one car could cause so much chaos?

Almost 7,000 drivers delayed in one morning; bridges up and down the Fraser River overflowing with idling cars and a SkyTrain system packed almost to capacity with a mix of regular commuters and those who, until that very moment, had considered themselves almost allergic to public transit.

At exactly 3:01 a.m. last Monday, the driver of one car set off a virtual disaster by cutting off a semi-trailer truck on the approach to the south end of the Port Mann bridge, causing the truck to jackknife and smash into a concrete divider.

The westbound lanes of the bridge were closed for nearly four hours as workers tried to clean up the fuel that had spilled from the truck, a delay that caused ripples of congestion throughout the region.

The crash highlighted the fact that for commuters driving across the Port Mann bridge — as well as those on several of the Lower Mainland’s busiest routes — congestion is a fact of life. And with one car being added to the region’s roads every 23 minutes, planning models show congestion could increase by a whopping 118 per cent by the year 2021 unless something is done.

“This causes alarm,” Clark Lim, a senior transportation engineer with TransLink, said Friday as he pointed to a slide showing a hypothetical model of future congestion in the Lower Mainland.

As he explained that model, a deadpan Lim showed a frightening 850 kilometres of roads that would be congested across the Lower Mainland by 2021 if we opted to immediately stop improving the region’s transportation infrastructure.

Of course, as Lim was quick to point out, that is not the plan.

From the Richmond-airport-Vancouver transit line to the proposed Golden Ears bridge across the Fraser the region will continue to build and improve its infrastructure, but as planners look to the future they have much to consider.

Current data show some of the most congested routes in the Lower Mainland being those leading to bridges in and out of the city, and on those roads where two major routes come together, such as during the morning rush hour on the westbound Mary Hill bypass.

Conventional wisdom may suggest the solution lies in expanding the bridges and adding more lanes — increasing supply to meet demand — although experts and planners say it is not that simple.

“You have to build, but you have to do it in a way that is strategic,” said Lim, citing the cautionary cliche: Yesterday’s solutions are the problems of today.

“We have to be careful about this,” he said, expressing an opinion shared by several experts.

“The traditional approach we have used in the past of basically building new lanes will not work anymore,” said Tarek Sayed, a transportation expert and professor of civil engineering at the University of British Columbia, citing cost issues, lack of space and environmental concerns as some of the leading factors standing in the way of such a solution.

Instead, he said, we have to find ways to make the existing system more effective.

“The only solution will be applying some advanced technologies, and also trying to reduce demand,” he said.

Sayed explained the implementation of new technologies — such as crash detectors, roadside traffic advisories for drivers and intelligent signal light systems — has reduced congestion by as much as 35 per cent in cities around the world. When coupled with programs aimed at getting people out of their cars, such as toll systems and improved transit, Sayed said, several other cities have shown there are ways to manage the problem without adding more lanes.

Lim added to this that knowing what causes the problems can go a long way to finding a solution.

For example, he said, 60 per cent of all congestion can be attributed to incidents such as crashes and roadside breakdowns. What’s more, he added, when traffic is heavy, an incident that is cleared away in under five minutes can still cause up to 20 minutes of congestion.

“Once you interrupt that flow it causes a chaotic reaction,” he said. “It’s a compound effect.”

Lim said there are things planners and engineers are working on to help decrease congestion, but that in many ways it is up to drivers to maintain a steady flow.

“One simple thing that doesn’t cost anything is paying attention,” he said, explaining that people who do things such as brake too quickly or delay before pulling away at a green light all contribute to congestion.

“If people understood how they influence the whole system we could make for a much safer system,” he said.

For people to change their ways, however, experts say people need to overcome a huge barrier; they need to realize they are not perfect.

“Right now people have a reputation of themselves of: ‘I’m an excellent driver.’ Almost everybody,” said Leon James, a professor of psychology at the University of Hawaii specializing in what he calls “driving psychology.”

“Obviously that can’t be true,” he said with a laugh.

James, 67, said he believes people learn aggressive driving habits from their parents, video games and movies at a very early age, and that it takes months, if not years, to get rid of that aggression.

To do that, he said, people need to observe what is going on in their minds while they drive.

“Instead of having this pure reputation of ourselves as an excellent driver, we actually need to witness ourselves and then you start noticing you are crazy in your head,” he said.

“The things you are thinking [while you are driving] are so bad you wouldn’t want to say them out loud to anybody,” he added.

James said that when he began studying his own driving habits he was surprised at the kinds of things that were going through his head.

“Rage, like I’m going to tear you apart,” he said, explaining what he used to think while driving.

“I’m going to slap you to death,” he continued. “I’m going to hang you by your fingertips. I’m going to smash you with my big tank. Things like that. I thought I was crazy.”

As he got others to track their own thoughts, however, James realized he was not alone.

“Most people, they try to be aggressive, competitive, annoying and hostile instead of helpful, supportive, peaceful and cooperative,” he said.

“They feel ‘I’ll be a schmuck if I let [other drivers] walk all over me,” he added. “That’s irrational thinking.”

To change his own behaviour, James said, he spent almost five years focusing on fixing his road rage one element at a time.

For example, he said, he would spend entire drives training himself not to get angry when people cut in front of him, and instead worked to anticipate their actions and to alter his own course to give them proper space.

“Now I like driving,” he said, adding he has almost completely changed his approach.

“It was a struggle that helped me in the rest of my life, my marriage, my teaching,” he said. “It’s not just a driving personality makeover, you also start to look at the fact that anger is the most common way that we manage people and things all day long,” he said.

Of course, this Zen-like approach to gridlock may not work for everyone.

Thankfully, for those who can’t grasp the idea of relaxing on the road, and of working with other drivers as opposed to against them, people like Lim and Sayed are working to find ways to make sure the future is not filled with mornings like Monday.

© The Vancouver Sun 2005

 

Sun

Monthly Indicators

October 6, 2005

(416) 594-7357                 (416) 594-7356                    (416) 956-3698                (416) 594-7354                   (416) 594-7359                   (416) 956-3219

An 84,000-square foot outdoor science park, costing about $4.5 million, has been proposed on the grounds of Science World

Chad Skelton
Sun

Science World will today announce an ambitious plan to build a $4.5-million Outdoor Science Park on the grounds around its iconic, geodesic dome.

The idea still requires city approval and additional funding, but high-tech millionaire Ken Spencer has already come forward with a donation of $1 million to get the project going, arguing that getting children interested in science is essential to developing B.C.’s high-tech sector.

“You’ve got to turn kids on to science,” said Spencer, who co-founded the software company CREO. “You’ve got to make science as fun as kicking a soccer ball.”

Detailed plans for the 84,000-square-foot park still need to be worked out, but conceptual drawings shown to The Vancouver Sun earlier this week envision three sections to the park.

The paid-entry Ken Spencer Science Park would be in front of Science World and included in general admission.

But the plan also include two free parks — an Environment Walk along Quebec Street, and a “Water Walk” along the water side of Science World.

All three sections would feature several outdoor science exhibits.

Science World president Bryan Tisdall said many existing outdoor science parks simply feature regular exhibits placed outside.

In contrast, he said, the Outdoor Science Park will focus on “the science of the environment and the science of sustainability.”

Initial ideas for exhibits include a model of the Capilano Reservoir that explains how the region’s watersheds work and a model “Climax Forest” that demonstrates how forests regenerate.

The design of the exhibits will be done by Science World staff, said Tisdall, but international companies will likely be contracted to build them.

Building such exhibits is a specialized art, he said, because they need to be able to withstand significant wear and tear.

“The motto is: If you build it, they will jump on it,” he said.

Tisdall said he hopes that the Outdoor Science Park will help renew interest in Science World and boost attendance by about 15 per cent — in part by making it an all-weather destination.

“We want to be as attractive on a sunny day as a rainy day,” he said.

Science World will launch a fundraising drive today, seeking support from individuals, corporate sponsors and the government to help cover the additional $3.5 million cost of the park.

Well, a little bit less than $3.5 million.

Eleven-year-old Shira Druker, whose mother was one of the consultants on the early plans, liked the idea of the park so much that she emptied her piggy bank twice to help pay for it, to the tune of $39.55.

The final plans for the park will require approval from city council and the parks board — votes that will likely take place after the municipal election this November.

Tisdall said initial discussions with councillors and city staff have been favourable.

If everything goes according to plan, Science World hopes to have the park up and running by 2007.

[email protected]

DID YOU KNOW:

– The Telus World of Science ‘golf ball’ is actually a geodesic dome, the design of which was created by American inventor R. Buckminster Fuller (1895-1983).

– The building was constructed for Expo 86 and served as the Expo Centre. During the World’s Fair the pavilion housed the Futures Theatre. The film A Freedom to Move was featured in the Omnimax Theatre.

– The building contains seven galleries, two theatres, four teaching labs/classrooms, a gift shop, a restaurant and administration offices.

– The building is 155 feet tall and has a volume of 36,790 cubic metres

– The building is supported by 182 piles and a foundation of reinforced steel in a concrete slab.

– There are 391 lights and 766 triangles on the Science World dome.

– There are 15,000 pounds of extruded steel and steel panels on the dome. The panels are 1/40,000th of an inch thick and are covered with a vinyl surface.

– A 45-minute Omnimax film requires about four kilometres of film stock.

– The Omnimax theatre screen is five stories high

– The 15,000-watt xenon lamp that lights the screen is so bright that if you placed it on the surface of the moon and focused it at a spot on Earth, you could see its light.

Source: Science World

EDUCATIONAL PLANNING: With university costs skyrocketing, it’s time to start saving

Wendy Mclellan
Sun

It’s almost time for the kids to get back to school and, even if September still means buying new crayons and shiny princess lunchboxes, paying for post-secondary education looms in the not-too-distant future.

Most parents want their children to have some education after Grade 12, but putting aside the money can be difficult. At the same time, the cost of attending college or university in Canada continues to outpace inflation, rising by an average of 2.7 per cent this year, according to a recent survey by an Ontario-based education savings plan provider.

The study, published by USC Education Savings Plans Inc., estimates university students living at home will need $7,826 for this year’s tuition, fees, books and other costs such as transportation, clothing and entertainment. If they live on campus, the cost increases to an average of $14,500.

A four-year undergraduate program beginning this fall will cost an average of $33,354 ($61,554 if they live on campus). But, for babies born today, the cost could be more than $70,000 ($124,000 if they don’t live at home), according to the report.

“Post-secondary education costs have risen almost four per cent each year for the last 18 years,” said Michael Geraghty, president and CEO of USCI. “A summer job and part-time work during the school year is no longer sufficient to support a student’s education and living expenses. Families need to find ways to start saving earlier.”

Geraghty admits that it’s tough for parents to find the extra money to save for the kids’ education, but the federal government does reward people who manage it with a grant that pays a 20-per-cent annual rate of return on deposits to registered education savings plans (RESPs).

“Despite the grants, people aren’t taking advantage of RESPs,” he said. “They might be thinking about making the mortgage payments or paying for living expenses, but it’s also important to save for education.”

The government offers a 20-per-cent Canada Education Savings Grant on the first $2,000 of annual contributions to registered plans. That’s $400 a year, on top of interest earned on the money.

“It never gets easy to save,” Geraghty said. “But the choice is to save now, or take on debt down the road. The government is not helping you pay off the house, but it has recognized the importance of an education.”

He said research shows 70 per cent of jobs require some form of post-secondary education. Another study, by an analyst with the Association of Universities and Colleges of Canada in Ottawa, calculates the value of a college of university degree is $1 million over the course of a career.

Leon Lau, a financial planner with Vancity, said even small deposits — $50 a month — to an RESP will build over time so parents can help pay for their children’s education.

“As a parent, you want to teach your kids to be self-sufficient, and having an education is one of the main ways to do that,” said Lau, who has two young daughters.

“People have lots of priorities — paying off debt, saving for retirement — but if you have a little money to even start an RESP, it would be better than delaying.”

Lau wants to set up an RESP for his own children, ages 3 and 1, but money is tight and he may have wait and try to catch up later.

“My wife is just back to work after a year on maternity leave and there is no money,” said Lau, who lives in a townhouse in Coquitlam that his family is quickly outgrowing.

“Daycare is expensive and it’s not cheap to live in the Lower Mainland. It’s overwhelming.”

When the kids are in school and daycare costs drop, he hopes he will have extra money to save for their future education. Putting aside birthday money or gifts from grandparents will also help, he said.

“I want to have an RESP, but it’s not something I’m stressing about,” Lau said. “If you can’t do it, you’re forfeiting $400 a year and that’s not the end of the world.”

In fact, he said, paying off other debt, or contributing extra to a retirement savings plan may be better options for some families.

Some of his clients believe children should pay for some of their post-secondary education themselves. They may provide free room and board, and some of the tuition costs, but their children have to pay for the rest with part-time work and student loans.

He said parents should research the terms and conditions of the various RESPs available, as well as their fee structures, before signing a contract. Some plans have restrictions on withdrawals and what kind of education programs qualify.

“If parents want to help, they find a way,” he said. “If they have to remortgage, they will do it. But the grant is a terrific incentive to set up an RESP.

“I would like to pay for the whole cost for my kids, and I will find a way.”

SAFE DEPOSITS

An RESP allows parents — or anyone — to save money for post-secondary education. The plan is registered by the federal government and contributions are made in the name of one or more beneficiaries.

Contributions are not tax-deductible, and income earned on the money is added to the student’s tax return.

Deposits can be made until the child reaches age 21 and must be withdrawn when the student reaches age 26.

If the child doesn’t pursue a post-secondary education, the RESP can be rolled into an RRSP (as long as there is room) without penalty.

The government pays a grant of 20 per cent on RESP deposits to a maximum of $400 a year until the child reaches age 18, for a total maximum grant of $7,200 per child. The grant amount was increased this year for families with lower incomes.

RESPs can be topped up — and the grants received — if the plan is set up when the child is older, but there are limits. The maximum annual RESP contribution for each beneficiary is $4,000 and the lifetime limit is $42,000.

For more information on RESPs, the Revenue Canada website is www.cra-arc.gc.ca
or talk with your financial institution or an advisor.

© The Vancouver Province 2005

WINE-TASTING: Love of grapes parlayed into one juicy job

Donna Nebenzahl
Province

MONTREAL — How does one turn a passion into a thriving business? In the case of Sandi Marques, one glass of wine at a time.

The 33-year-old sommelier and wine educator started her business two years ago in Ontario — after 14 years working in restaurants and hotels. Six months later, she moved to Quebec with her husband, a sales trainer for Novartis.

It seemed the right fit for a woman whose strongest childhood memories involve crates of grapes being delivered each year to her Portuguese household in Cambridge, Ont., where her dad made wine.

Marques chooses a glass of Quinta do Portal 1999 from the Doro region of Portugal.

She holds the glass at a 45-degree angle.

“Look,” she says intensely. “Look at the colour at the rim and the centre, the core. There’s a slight hint of brown/yellow tinge at the rim, because of contact with the barrel.”

Then she takes the glass by the stem — “this is how we find its legs” — and swirls it enthusiastically. Clear streams of

glycerine wash down the sides, and, depending on its age and quality, the streams will be thicker or thinner to denote alcohol content. She’s spot on at 14-per-cent alcohol.

“First you look, then swirl and finally you smell,” she says.

Smell is the most important sense for the wine-taster, whose abilities are so refined, she’s able to use words like vegetal, earthy, dark plum, black pepper or

coffee to describe a particular aroma in the wine. All that takes is practice, Marques says.

“The best way to get the vocabulary for wine is to smell things. Smell pepper, melon, canned and then fresh peaches,” she says. “Pay attention to smell and you’ll see that you can apply that to a glass of wine.

“Most people, when they start appreciating wine, use generic words like fruity or woody. What gets you to become a better taster is the nose. And research suggests that women have better noses than men.”

The last thing is taste, the last of Marques’s three Ss: sight, smell, savour.

To taste, first the sip of wine is swished all around so it makes contact with all parts of the mouth. “Like you’re gargling,” she says. “Then take in a little air, to help the olfactory meet the tongue.”

She swallows. “Nice wine, medium-bodied, good level of acidity. The wood barrels have infused into the wine, and it has a medium finish [finish being how long the flavour lingers].”

This wine, she decides, would be lovely with the tiered duck and potatoes with apple being served as a first course at her Flavours of Portugal wine tasting next week.

It’s another element of her quietly growing business, Cork and Karma: the occasional dinner with wine — in this case, a three-course gourmet meal paired with four wine tastings — she plans to hold.

Marques, mother of two small children, has been well schooled in both food and wine, with a commerce degree in hospitality and tourism management from Ryerson University, a culinary diploma from George Brown College and her sommelier’s licence from the International Sommelier Guild.

She named the company, she says, after the cork trees in Portugal.

“And I added the karma because I believe that the reason we’re here is to give back.”

Her dreams of wine are bigger than a business that now includes a 200-member wine club, wine tastings and seminars, a wine-cellar subscription service that offers would-be collectors advice on stocking their cellars and a newsletter.

She is in the growing stage of her business, pouring all her revenue back into the company.

“Growing a business takes time,” says Marques.

© The Vancouver Province 2005

. . . I feel more in control than going through an agent

Rosemary MacCracken
Province

The Internet is helping people like Mandy Moore realize their travel dreams. From the comfort of her home or office, she can check out the destinations she’d like to visit, find out what services and entertainment are available, and see what flights, hotels and car rentals cost.

Moore, 31, takes five or six trips a year and always shops for travel online, comparing two or three providers. “I sit at a desk all day, so it’s easy to click around and see what’s available,” she says. “And I feel more in control than going through an agent. I can see range of prices and other options.”

A 2004 study of online travel by TNS Canadian Facts says one in five travellers used agents to make their bookings, compared with 12 per cent who purchased from full-service travel websites. And those who use the Internet are not all enthusiastic about the experience. The study found 37 per cent were fully satisfied, 50 per cent were somewhat satisfied and 10 per cent were decidedly unimpressed.

Walid Salem, director of customer relationship management at the Canadian Tourism Commission’s e-marketing group, cites a recent report published by PhoCusWright Inc., which surveys online travellers in the U.S. It found that four in 10 travel shoppers have browsed at online travel sites but ultimately purchased directly from suppliers.

“Online providers can clearly improve their footing with travellers,” says Salem. The CTC is an Ottawa-based consortium of public- and private-sector tourism partners.

The key to doing so, he adds, “may be selling multiple travel components — such as flight, hotels, car and tours — in one online package.” He notes a 400-per-cent jump in online U.S. travel package spending to $4 billion US in 2004 from $1.2 billion in 2002. “And that market is projecting spending of $10 billion in 2006.”

The full-service travel websites have been delivering travel packages since the mid-1990s, adding features and refinements over the years and Salem predicts the online arms of mainstream travel outfits will be following this model.

Expedia.ca started serving the Canadian market in 1997, a year after Expedia.com, the mother company, was launched in the U.S., and its site has gone through about 18 revisions. Today, with a click of a mouse, visitors can search for flights, hotels or flight-hotel packages, and create their own unique holidays. Expedia partners about 20,000 hotels, and provides a wealth of visual and written information on each.

“We clearly indicate what hotels are child-friendly, and you can also search according to amenities,” says Sean Shannon, Expedia.ca’s Toronto-based managing director. “If you’re going to Orlando and you’ve got to have a pool for the kids, the Wyndham Orlando Resort offers two children’s pools, three outdoor splash pools, and shuttles to Universal Studios, SeaWorld and Wet ‘n’ Wild.”

Travel insurance can be added to an Expedia.ca package, as can transportation to and from the hotel. Sightseeing tours and entertainment can also be booked at many travel destination locations.

Travellers to Dublin, Ireland, for instance, can book a 90-minute Dublin tour or day trips outside the city, while visitors to New York can purchase tickets to Broadway shows playing during their stay in the city.

“You can book all the components of your trip before you leave home,” Shannon says, “and not waste precious travel time making decisions.”

U.S.-based Travelocity operates in a similar way. Flight/hotel packages can be created by keying in the departure city and destination, and hotel searches can be narrowed by clicking on desired amenities such as swimming pools or fitness centres. Last-minute deals are also flagged. But keep in mind that Travelocity prices are in U.S. dollars and some of its flight routes are not as direct as those offered by Canadian providers.

Flights, hotels and insurance can be booked with Air Canada’s online travel partner, Destina.ca, but there is less of an emphasis on the “package” than with Expedia.ca or Travelocity. Shoppers can check out what flights and hotels are offered, but book these separately. Hotels can be located near particular landmarks at travel destinations, or found according to the amenities they offer. And travellers earn Aeroplan Miles for all flights and hotel bookings.

The feature of shopping for flights on aircanada.com or destina.ca is that viewers see a grid listing the prices for a range of days around their departure and return dates.

Viewers may see, for instance, that they will pay a lower fare if they return the day after their planned return date and can adjust their times accordingly.

“The web allows us to provide greater transparency to customers,” says Laura Cook, Air Canada’s Toronto-based communications manager. “The customer is in the driver’s seat. He can choose the flight and fare that suits his need.”

Air Canada customers can also check in for their flights online, determine the flight departure or arrival status and register to receive alerts of any flight changes via e-mail, pager or text-enabled telephone.

Packaging now includes extended families living across the continent.

Moore frequently vacations with relatives who live in the U.S. Two years ago, her family reunited around Christmas in Las Vegas. She arranged flights for her grandmother and brother in Baltimore, her sister in New York, her mother in Fairfax, Va., and cousins in Pennsylvania and North Carolina. This summer, she’ll meet her mother and sister for a spa weekend in Massachusetts. “It’s more fun getting together away from home,” she says.

“Family vacation reunions, particularly to sun destinations, are a growing trend,” notes Expedia.ca’s Shannon. Visitors to Expedia can set up mock itineraries and e-mail them to others; when a group agrees on the details of a trip, flights and rooms can be booked individually or by one person.

Air Canada online customers can book for up to nine people on Air Canada or Air Canada Jazz flights and on flights operated by Star Alliance partner airlines.

Most online travel sites encourage customers to create user profiles — with information such as destination preferences and meal requests voluntarily provided by the customer. This allows providers to send out customized e-mail about offers that might appeal to these individuals. There’s a big rush in the travel industry to create customer loyalty in this way, Salem says.

“The technology is certainly there, but so far the industry hasn’t gone as far with this as the online bookstores have.”

Consumers can expect to see more of this customized marketing in the future. Shannon says Expedia is developing ways to offer its customers greater “personalization.”

Map it out

Most online travel providers provide maps of the areas in which their properties are located. Call up any hotel offered by Expedia.ca or Destina.ca and you’ll be offered a map of its sounding area; if it’s in a city, a map of the surrounding neighbourhood will be shown.

Travelocity’s properties also come with maps and directions from major airports.

Travellers who want to check out areas away from their hotels, however, will generally have to do their own research but there is online assistance.

Visitors to MultiMap ( www.multimap.com) can look at a continent, a country or a city, then zoom down to a specific intersection. The site also allows visitors to book hotels within blocks of a refined search, and provides door-to-door travel directions.

Need to find out what languages are spoken in Afghanistan? Another site, GeographyIQ (www.geographyiq.com), provides facts, figures, as well as maps, about a host of countries’ geography, demographics, economy, government, political system, history and cultural background. A foreign currency converter offers conversion rates from everything from pounds to pesos, rupees and rubles.

WorldAtlas ( www.worldatlas.com) offers an archive of printable city maps from around the world.

Dot travel

As of Dec. 1, consumers will see changes in the web addresses of many businesses, organizations and professionals in the global travel industry. Many domain names will end with the “.travel” extension (as in xyztours.travel).

The Travel Partnership Corp. a Washington, D.C.-based non-profit international consortium of travel industry members, is the sponsor of dot.travel and its goal is to develop and enforce standards for .travel members worldwide.

Candidates for dot.travel domain names will have to display acceptable business practice standards. This will help ensure consumers that these are legitimate travel businesses and organizations, says Susan Wong, the Tourism Industry Association of Canada’s communications manager in Ottawa.

“Right now, you don’t really know what you’re getting with an online travel company.”

“It would provide branding and context to an URL,” the CTC’s Salem says. “Consumers will know from the dot.travel extension that a firm is a travel business. But will it assure the authenticity of a business? That depends on just how it is regulated.”

Expedia.ca’s Shannon says his company and its sister firms around the world will not be moving to a .travel domain name.

“It may have some relevance for the broader industry,” he says, “but it doesn’t suit our model. We are set up by country with the .ca extension in Canada — which means all our content is relevant to Canadians — .com in the U.S., .de in Germany, .fr in France and .co.uk in the United Kingdom.”

SITES TO CHECK OUT

Canadians interested in exploring their own country can research Canadian destinations at user-friendly online visitor centres.

Links to provincial/territorial tourist associations and bureaus can be found at www.tiac-aitc.ca/english/usefullinks.asp. And the Tourism Industry Association of Canada’s site at www.tiac-aitc.ca/english/CACVB_members.asp provides links to regional/city tourism bureaus.

For more on travel in Canada, www.shopincanada.com/

Travel_Leisure/Travel_Agencies_Services/

The Last Minute Club: www.lastminute.com

Club Med: www.clubmedvacations.ca

For hotel reservations: www.hotelscentral.com

For discount travel and more, www.canadaretail.ca/Travelguide2.html

© The Vancouver Province 2005

Province

TORONTO — Summertime is travel time for many Canadians, but sometimes even the best-laid plans can fly out the window, causing you to cancel or cut short a trip.

Last week’s crash of an Air France plane at Pearson International Airport is evidence that when things go wrong, they go wrong in a hurry.

Thankfully all survived this episode, but the resulting turmoil left thousands of passengers scrambling, right across the country.

Cancellation insurance may reduce the financial hit of an unforeseen crisis, such as a terrorist attack, hurricane or major illness, but experts advise travellers to know their options.

Stan Seggie, president of RBC Travel Insurance Co., says that his company sells trip cancellation and trip interruption insurance covering 42 types of risk that include medical emergencies, pregnancy, death, unemployment, some airline foulups and government travel advisories.

“It covers the vast majority of things that can happen,” Seggie says.

However, it’s important to know the terms and conditions of cancellation and interruption policies, he adds.

For example, RBC requires that a traveller claiming cancellation coverage must have cancelled the trip within one business day of the cause of the cancellation, and must at the same time have notified RBC.

Usually travellers should go over the insurance coverage at the time the trip is booked.

There are limits to what you can expect.

If your destination is hit by a disaster like a hurricane or an act of terrorism, you will likely be covered — but not if the event is regarded as too minor or too distant from where you’re going.

One factor to consider is whether the Canadian government has issued a travel warning for the area.

Check out the federal website www.voyage.gc.ca, which includes travel warnings about various parts of the world.

Seggie says cancellation insurance is designed to compensate travellers for things that are beyond their control, rather than simply a change of mind, in order to keep the premiums affordable.

RBC Travel Insurance, part of the group that owns the Royal Bank of Canada, writes about three million policies annually — half for trip cancellation or interruption and half for out-of-country medical coverage.

The average premium is about $75 to $80, Seggie says, but an individual’s premium will depend on age and the value of the trip being insured.

Laura Cooke, a spokeswoman for Air Canada, agrees that cancellation insurance often makes a lot of sense.

However, she notes that in times of crisis the airline may relax restrictions on its tickets — allowing travellers to rebook flights for a later time, after the danger has passed.

“It’s going to depend on the incident and the severity of the incident,” Cooke says.

In addition, some airline tickets may be refundable even in normal circumstances, while others are not, and travellers should take that into consideration when comparing fares and booking flights.

Cooke says: “The deeply discounted fares tend to come with more restrictions.”

© The Vancouver Province 2005

David Baines
Sun

In a decision released last week, B.C. Supreme Court judge Bruce Cohen invoked a piece of jurisprudence that should strike fear into the heart of any reasonable person: “If the law drives us to accept what one might consider an absurd result, we must accept that.”

Well, it is a fair bet that the Bank of Nova Scotia is not about to accept the absurd result in the case of a customer who deposited a cheque for $904,563. When the bank found out the cheque was counterfeit, it quite naturally scooped the funds out of the customer’s accounts. According to Cohen’s ruling, it had no right to do so.

The net result is that the bank is out $904,563 and the customer has received a $904,563 windfall by successfully negotiating a bogus cheque. This is an absurd result in itself, but consider also the implications for ordinary bank customers: the only way banks can guard against this sort of loss in future is to hold payment on cheques for the 30, 60 or more days it takes to confirm their legitimacy. So unless the decision is overturned on appeal, you may find yourself waiting for weeks after presenting a cheque before the bank will allow you to actually withdraw the money.

The case involves two Bank of Nova Scotia customers, Audie Hashka and Paul Backman, who owned a private company called B.M.P. Global Distribution which was involved in a very sketchy business, indeed.

BMP distributed a line of non-stick bakeware manufactured by another company called Pantec Technologies. There was no written agreement between the two companies. Despite the absence of a formal agreement, BMP sold U.S. distribution rights to a person named Sunn Newman for $1.2 million in September 2001. Hashka admitted the figure was pulled out of thin air. Nobody bothered with financial statements, projected cash flow statements, business or marketing plans.

The background of Newman was also a mystery. Asked what he knew of him, Backman said: “Only that he was a sharp-looking guy that seemed like he had a lot of potential.” Curiously, given they hardly knew each other, they didn’t bother drawing up a written distribution agreement.

Despite these rather tenuous dealings, in October 2001 Hashka and Backman received a $904,563 cheque, payable to BMP, representing a down payment on the distribution deal. There was no covering letter, just the cheque.

The cheque was drawn a Royal Bank account in the name of a company called First National, and the sender of the cheque was a person named “E. Smith.” Hashka and Backman said they didn’t know either party.

On Oct. 22, 2001, the two men presented the cheque to the Bank of Nova Scotia branch at 10th and Langley in Burnaby. At the time, there was only $59 in BMP’s account. If the Royal Bank returned the cheque for insufficient funds, the bank would be in big trouble. So the manager quite naturally refused to give them any credit until the cheque cleared.

First National had the required funds in its account. By Oct. 30, 2001 the cheque had cleared and the bank released the hold. Then calamity struck.

On Nov. 9, Royal Bank officials contacted the Bank of Nova Scotia and advised that their customer, First National, had told them the cheque was counterfeit.

By this time, Hashka and Backman had spent some of the money to pay bills. In one mysterious transaction, Hashka had transferred $20,000 US to an account at Citibank in New York, payable to LMP Prestsquare, as per the advice of A.U. Salamain. Both men said they didn’t know either party.

The balance of the money — a total of $776,650 — remained in BMP’s account or had been transferred to other accounts run by the two men at the same branch.

Bank of Nova Scotia officials froze the accounts and began asking questions, but Hashka had no answers. He said he had tried to contact “Newman” about the counterfeit cheque, but had been unsuccessful.

At the request of the Royal Bank, the bank froze the remaining funds and remitted them to the Royal Bank.

Hashka and Backman, represented by lawyers Paul Jaffe and Justis Raynier, said they didn’t know the cheque was fraudulent, and there was no proof that they did know. They argued that once the cheque was settled (that is, paid by the Royal Bank), the Bank of Nova Scotia was at no risk and had no right to the funds.

Judge Cohen concurred. He said that if the bank wanted to seize the funds for the benefit of the Royal Bank, it should have sought a court order. But it didn’t, so he ordered them to return the funds.

Ross McGowan, a lawyer with Borden Ladner Gervais, was not involved in this case, but he does legal work for most of the major banks. He is too polite to call the result absurd, rather he calls it a “highly unusual and remarkable outcome.” He says counterfeit or altered cheque cases are often presented to banks. He deals with “at least once a month, and more often once a week.” Last Tuesday, he said, he had three such cases. To make the system work, he said, banks need to be permitted to charge back these cheques.

“The first implication of this decision, if allowed to stand, is that those persons who have negotiated counterfeit or materially-altered cheques . . . would receive windfall proceeds from the commission of a fraud, and that simpy cannot be allowed to stand,” he said.

“The second implication is that it would severely curtail the ability of financial institutions to allow access to funds from cheques.”

He said that, due to sophisticated counterfeit methods, it is impossible for banks to determine whether cheques are bogus. Only the customer can determine that, and that takes time.

“If this decision is allowed to stand, there would be no reasonable way to process cheques without 60 or 90-day holds. Imagine what that would do to customers.”

© The Vancouver Sun 2005

Music, colours, fuses: The basics of fireworks

Sun

It all starts with a song.
The elaborate fireworks displays during the Celebration of Light, which kicks off Wednesday, all begin with the selection of a musical score, often months in advance.

The fireworks designers then plan the sequences of sky-high explosions that will make up the 25-minute shows without the benefit of any test runs, says Maude Furtado, pyrotechnic supervisor of Vancouver’s Celebration of Light.

“The designer must know all the different effects — there are thousands,” Furtado said Friday.

“There is no rehearsal for any fireworks show, so a good designer must know his stuff very well,” she said. “It’s actually as much of a surprise for him as for the rest of the public.”

Since the invention of the first firecracker more than 2,000 years ago — when bamboo was roasted to produce a loud bang intended to frighten evil spirits — fireworks have evolved into complex explosives that can cost thousands of dollars apiece.

The basis of a firework — a fuse surrounded by pea-sized balls that spark when ignited — has not changed much over the past few decades. But today’s fireworks are available in an array not likely dreamed of 20 centuries ago, Furtado said.

The varieties number in the “thousands and thousands,” she explained. “There are many different effects, different sizes, different colours,” she said.

In simple terms, the length of the fuse dictates when a firework will explode. The flammable chemicals contained inside the firework’s shell determine the colour and lighting effects.

There are six common colours for fireworks — white, yellow, red, green, blue and purple — with deep blue and purple considered the most difficult to produce.

China is the biggest [manufacturer] in terms of quantities,” Furtado said. “In terms of quality though, there’s a couple of competitors — the Spanish and the Italians are very renowned for quality shells.”

Canada, however, does not manufacture its own fireworks.

“They mainly buy from Spain, they also buy from China,” said Furtado, who has worked with fireworks for 10 years. Many competitive teams, such as China, are actually fireworks manufacturers, Furtado said. “This is how they get the contracts for the next Olympics games or the big international events,” she said. “This is their world window, so they want to look good.” A single show would cost more than $200,000 for the fireworks and infrastructure such as the launching barge, Furtado said.

“It’s a three-day setup for each 25-minute show, with 15 people working 10 hours a day for those three days,” she said.

While fireworks have become more elaborate over the years, they have also become more regulated.

Patrick Nolan, an inspector with Natural Resources Canada, which oversees fireworks safety and regulation in Canada, said that people working with fireworks must take a one-day safety course every year.

There is legislation covering the maximum size of firework shells (30 centimetres) and the distance between the launch pad and the crowd (300 metres for the Vancouver show), Nolan said. Natural Resources Canada also individually inspects every firework that will be used during the Celebration of Light. And while it’s always a good idea to be cautious around fireworks, Nolan says far more injuries and fatalities are caused by commercially available fireworks than by public displays like the Celebration of Light. There has never been a fatality caused by a fireworks shell at a Vancouver show, but five people were killed in 1999 during the Symphony of Fire when a pleasure craft hit a tow rope between a tug boat and a barge

Bob Ransford
Sun