The South Bayview Bulldog

Picture by Natalie Hardy posted to Facebook

The newly constructed suspension bridge over the Nipigon River in Northern Ontario has snapped like a pretzel in cold weather about two months after the $106 million structure was opened. A report in the local newspaper says the shift in the bridge, captured by local resident Natalie Hardy above, closes direct traffic across Canada. According to reports, the alternative require vehicles headed west or east to detour through the United States. Westbound traffic from Thunder Bay would have to travel south to the Pigeon River Border crossing and then from Duluth to Sault Ste Marie. It says the Lake Helen First Nation Band is concerned about assisting westbound travellers who will be forced to stop on the east side of the bridge looking for gas and food. The NetNewsLedger says it may be necessary to close roads in order to keep large numbers of people from getting stranded.

$106 million Nipigon bridge under construction

Windy weather and cold temperatures have caused a tree to fall in Etobicoke, severing power to about 2,900 customers, and in Scarborough, sending a TTC bus into a tree on Lawrence Avenue East near Brimley Road. The tree subsequently fell over onto several parked cars.  Three passengers received minor injuries.  There is no cause detail on the cause of the accident but it appears to weather related. Which is what people will be dealing with this week as temperatures sink, as reported by the Weather Network above, to more seasonable winter values.

Leaside Jr. Wildcats romped to victory over the Ottawa Lady Sens Sunday afternoon at Leaside Arena. Leaside was able fend off all power play attacks by the Lady Sens as they tried to score during the Wildcats worrisome  12 minutes of penalty time. Leaside remains in 7th place in the league with the fewest games played among contending squads. Below are the teams to beat.  PWHL summary

CBC

Long-time Toronto residents sometimes wistfully recall the civil public behaviour that made it the envy of the continent. That would be then, not now, because the hunt is on to find the persons who were angry because a man asked them to  turn down their loud music on a bus. So angry they followed him off the TTC and viciously beat and robbed him. These are security camera images of two men suspected of the attack around 5:30 p.m. on November 26 on the Jane Street bus approaching Lawrence Avenue West. Both suspects are described as being between 18 and 25 years of age and standing about five-foot-seven. The first suspect is described as having a medium build. He was unshaven with blonde/brown hair. He wore a black Blue Jays baseball cap and a grey hooded sweatshirt. The second suspect has a thin build, short black hair, was clean-shaven and was last seen wearing a black Moose-Knuckle jacket with a fur hood. Anyone with information is asked to contact police at 416-808-1200 or call Crime Stoppers anonymously at 416-222-TIPS (8477).

Who knows what curious motive prompted the bizarre Sean Penn to get together with Rolling Stone magazine to interview the Mexican druglord El Chapo (Shorty) Guzman. Guzman is five foot, six inches tall. From all appearances Guzman is also short on a grasp of reality claiming he “never wanted to hurt anyone.” Cynics are saying Penn turned in Guzman though this would be an uncommonly sensible thing for the showboating Penn to do especially since the meeting is said to have taken place in October.  More likely, the authorities got wind of the caper on their own.

Rafal B rzoska

The InPost invasion comes courtesy of a Polish business tycoon named Rafał Brzoska. (inset with profile below). The evidence of his grand plan in Canada can be seen outside Loblaws on Moore Ave. So Loblaws knows all about this project. So does Shell Canada and no doubt many other big corporations. There’s a locker in the Shell station in Summerhill on Yonge St. All across Toronto, and apparently Canada, a huge program of locker placement is proceeding quickly and smoothly. InPost parcel lockers are now, by the firm’s release, the biggest international network of parcel lockers providing “a fast and convenient method of shipping and collecting parcels around the clock, seven days a week, with no queues and at a convenient location.”

CORPORATE OWNER IS INTEGER.PL

On its website, the Polish firm says InPost has already introduced its parcel lockers in the United Kingdom, France, Italy, Poland, Ireland, Iceland, Lithuania, Latvia, Estonia, Russia, Czech Republic, Slovakia, Colombia, Canada, Australia and Saudi Arabia. It says it plan was to have over 5,000 of parcel lockers across Europe, both Americas and the Middle East by the end of 2015. It is planning to deploy a further 4,000 such lockers. According to the release, development of the InPost parcel lockers network is being conducted by the easyPack company, in collaboration with the PineBridge Investments Fund. This is a subsidiary of Integer.pl Group headquartered in Krakow, Poland’s second largest city. On the Internet, the president and apparent genius behind InPost is Rafał Brzoska.

COMPETES WITH “MONOPOLIST” POSTAL SERVICE

The company describes Brzoska this way: “He created a nationwide network of door drops and addressed marketing materials distribution, turning Integer into the leader on the distribution market in Poland. InPost, which has been operating for just a few years, already competes successfully with the Polish postal services monopolist, Poczta Polska. has continued its dynamic expansion of the InPost parcel lockers network by increasing its reach in key European e-commerce markets including, amongst others, the UK and Italy. The company has also intensified its activity on other continents.”

The news blog Yonge and Roxborough News has taken this picture of an InPost locker in the Shell station at Yonge and Rowanwood. It’s a service to receive and pick up online merchandise orders. One such locker has been installed beside the Loblaws at 301 Moore Ave. How it works