Nor'West News: August 16, 2016

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8 Tuesday August 16 2016 forever Style is NZ Designer Label Sizes 6 – 22 Dress to impress; whatever the occasion SMITH & BOSTON Prebbleton Village | Christchurch Ph: 03 349 5646 www.smithandboston.co.nz Your Local Views Let’s keep Chch fluoride-free Former personal trainer John Verd was born in Christchurch’s sister city Seattle, United States, and moved to New Zealand in January last year. He writes this week’s opinion piece on fluoridation I love Christchurch water! It’s one of the many exceptional things we’d heard about the Garden City before moving here. So I was naturally concerned to learn about proposed changes to our water system. I discovered at an early age how location could affect water quality. When my grand-mother moved to the Cascade Mountains near Seattle, she said that the tap water there had a ”sweetness” to it. She was absolutely right - there was a huge difference between our aquifers in Spokane and her spring water in Snoqualmie. It wasn’t until much later that I paid any attention to what is actually in our water. I’d heard people protest against fluoridation, but wrote them off as paranoid conspiracy theorists. It wasn’t until becoming a personal trainer that I actually questioned the practice. The research was eye opening. Our water is being treated with an industrial waste product called hydrofluorosilicic acid. This chemical is a by-product of the phosphate fertiliser industry. Although classified as hazardous waste, it is barrelled up and sold, unrefined, to communities across the country. This is the fluoride in public water. Former vice president and senior chemist at the United States Environmental Protection Agency headquarters, Dr William Hirzy, had this to say about it: “If this stuff gets out into the air, it’s a pollutant; if it gets into the river, it’s a pollutant; if it gets into the lake, it’s a pollutant; but if it goes straight into your drinking water system, it’s not a pollutant. That’s amazing.” Hydrofluorosilicic acid is far different from the sodium fluoride, which is not for ingestion, commonly used in toothpaste. This begs the question: Why would they use this dangerous form of fluoride? A likely reason is cost. Because it costs corporations many thousands of dollars per tonne to neutralise and dispose of it, they instead sell it to municipalities as a ‘product’. Chemist and worldrenowned fluoride researcher Dr Paul Connett lectured in Christchurch in July 2016. He listed 50 human studies NOR’WEST NEWS finding that elevated fluoride exposure is associated with reduced IQ. Christchurch has managed to remain fluoride free for the last 30 years, but new legislation may allow for fluoridation by 2018 unless the public demands a place at the table in this decision. And that’s what is keeping me up at night. Do you, like John Verd, stay awake at night worried about fluoridation? Should we allow fluoridation of our water? Share your views with us. Email andrew. king@starmedia.kiwi THE HOME OF GOOD BAKING DAILY BREAD White, Wheatmeal, Grain NO LIMIT! ONLY 99 C EA FUDGE SLICE A choc biscuit base topped with yummy choc icing - an old style Kiwi favourite. ONLY $ 3 49 EA $25,000 TRAVEL GIVEAWAY CHEESE ROUNDS 4PK A soft white roll generously topped with cheese and perfect for lunches. $ 1 99 Purchase 2 x 2L Dairy Dale Milk to enter the draw to win $1,000 worth of travel vouchers for your family! 25 WINNERS - 1 PER STORE! MILK Dairy Dale 2L varieties. $ 5 98 2 FOR or $3.19 each FAMILY MINCE & CHEESE PIE $ 5 49 EA Promotional pricing available while stocks last from 15/08/16 to 21/08/16. Images are serving suggestions only. Open 7 days | 8 Convenient local locations Hornby • Barrington • Ferry Rd • Papanui • Riccarton • Upper Riccarton • New Brighton • Rangiora BAKERIES www.couplands.co.nz
NOR’WEST NEWS Tuesday August 16 2016 9 A reader responds to an article on a petition launched to fix the Harewood Rd intersection Michael Stirling – Harewood I’ve lived in Harewood since 2002, and can honestly say without doubt this is one of the worst intersections in Christchurch, particularly since the 2011 earthquakes whereby traffic has virtually doubled as more and more businesses and home-owners relocated to the west side of the city. It is just like the Grim Reaper advert on television a few years back, where people start sweating profusely at the wheel before closing their eyes and hope for a miracle crossing. The problem is (both ways) that drivers on Gardiners Rd and Breens Rd have to take calculated risks across four lanes of Harewood Rd (being two east-bound and two west-bound). The number of times I’ve experienced near misses is well into the 30s. I’ve been stopped in my tracks many times as I head into work, and have even given up tooting now, as it’s utterly pointless, you simply can’t educate some people. Sure, I can understand their frustrations and lack of patience (particularly after sitting idle for 3-4min at the ‘stop’ signs) and they end up virtually playing Russian roulette, praying they will cross safely without getting hit. The simple solution is traffic lights – just as the city council installed at the other end of Gardiners Rd – on the Sawyers Arms Rd intersection, which incidentally is only two lanes wide and not four, so go figure. In my view, it’s only a matter of time before there is a fatality (and I sincerely hope it is not me or my family, or anyone else for that matter). So hopefully the city council will come to their alert senses, smell the coffee (or should that be tar) before they end up with blood on their hands. FLAME FILES Give yourself the best chance of escape Conditions apply. While stocks last. • By Mark Thomas – Fire Risk Management Officer BY RECENT standards the past week has been remarkably quiet. We’ve still been to plenty of false alarms, ambulance assistance calls and car crashes but fires, apart from the inevitable kitchen cooking fires (two this week), have been few in number. So let’s have a look at those things that can make our lives safer from fire that are easy to arrange in any home. Firstly, and by far most importantly, is the use of smoke alarms. I grew up in the days before widespread plastics and foams. So when I was a kid it took about 10min for any fire inside a house to go from ignition to flashover (the state where the entire contents of a room are on fire). Now, with the proliferation of oil-based products (those plastics and foams) in homes the time to flashover is reduced to 3min. That’s where smoke alarms, recommended in every bedroom, hallway and living room, are vital to give us the earliest possible warning of fire so we can escape well before that 3min is up. Because if you don’t, you’re probably in real trouble. After your own escape, making sure everyone else in the house is aware, is the first priority before having a meeting place where all can be accounted for, and phoning 111 by cellphone or neighbour’s landline. Along with smoke alarms these are the basics of a home escape plan. If we all had one I’d investigate far fewer fatal fires. That would be fantastic! Ilam Watchmakers 207 Waimairi Rd. Ph 357 1002 SCIRT programme on the home straight SCIRT’s five year programme of repairs to pipes, roads, bridges and retaining walls is almost complete and will finish in December. Most of our repairs involve fixing the city’s underground pipe networks with only small amount of our work focused on roads. Our roading work largely involves fixing where we have dug down to repair and replace the earthquake damaged pipes beneath. The result may look a little patchy but we repair roads to a reliable and serviceable standard. The City Council and NZ Transport Agency will continue completing ongoing repairs to the city's earthquake-damaged roads after SCIRT. Progress in your neighbourhood • Fixing the Northern Relief, one of Christchurch’s biggest wastewater pipes running through Fendalton, Merivale and St Albans is more than halfway through and will be completed at the end of the year. • Essential wastewater repairs in Aikmans Road in Merivale have begun and will be completed at the end of the year. • Ongoing repairs to the wastewater networks in Fendalton, Strowan, Papanui and Bryndwr are due to finish next month. • Your support is helping us to get the job done, thank you from the SCIRT team. Want more info? Email: info@scirt.co.nz Phone: 941 8999 Find out about work in your area: www.scirt.co.nz Email us on: info@scirt.co.nz to get our: Weekly Traffic Update Monthly e-Newsletter Follow us on Twitter: @SCIRT_info #chchtraffic • Renal Prasad, Welder with SCIRT’s McConnell Dowell team. Programme funded by
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Nor'West News: August 16, 2016

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