Vrooom, vrooom!

I live in a land of trucks. The Canadian Oil patch is truck country. My long, suburban block sports 26 three-quarter ton trucks, all with oversized wheels, off-road tires and four wheel drive. Most of them are spotless, never having been driven off any road, anywhere. Trucks are a sign of manliness. I've seen a few with leather sacks hanging off the trailer hitch, containing two large ball-bearings. "This guy has real balls!"

Virtually every truck on my street has 'Command Start.' On winter mornings, this allows the owner to stumble out of bed, start the car with a remote, then have a leisurely shower, dress and eat breakfast before gearing up and get off to work. All the while, the eight cylinder diesel or gas engine is grumbling away in the cold, sending up clouds of exhaust. Some mornings, when I return hoe from my five AM walk in the dark, there are dozen such vehicles pouring out emmisions! My next door neighbor set a record of sorts the other morning: his vehicle idled for 65 minutes before he drove off.

Nearby cities are in the process of implementing idling by-laws. Out here in cow country? Not a chance. I recall when I worked at the Health Sciences Centre in Winnipeg, it was discovered that the poor air quality in one section of the facility was based on the fact that the unloading dock for supply trucks was just below the air intake for the whole building!

In the dear deaddays beyond recall when I ran a dozen miles before breakfast, I recall one morning running along Kenaston Avenue in Winnipeg, a major artery into the west end downtown. The traffic was heavy and the wind was from the west. I was on the east side of the road, and I had to stop moving, and then get away, because I couldn't get enough oxygen to keep running.

I suppose that living in a rural area allows people to think that truck emissions are no big deal, that our air is pure and clean. When you throw in the odor from the cattle auctions down town, and the hog farms to the north of us, you cannot mistake the fact that we live in a land suffocating under air pollution.

I have no idea what to do about this. I wrestle with the option of talking to my neighbour about his truck, or of writing a letter to the Editor of the local paper. That seems pretty feeble, however. I actually have no faith that our town council would give the problem five minutes. Most of them have oil in their blood, and wouldn't see a problem! I imagine folk in every urban centre feels the same way. I wonder how they get their municipal authorities to take the local pollution issue seriously? Perhaps I should start with the car dealers: how long does it actually take for the engine of a Ford F-150 to warm to a safely running temperature at -25°? Would it take 45 minutes for the cab to be warm enough for the driver to work in his shirtsleeves, rather than his parka? Hmmmm. It's a thought.