St. George Parish

The present St. George Parish is the second church standing on the corner of Commissioners Road at Lynden Crescent. The original house of worship was a modern, for the time, 1950s A-frame structure.

By 1992 --- less than four decades after opening --- deterioration in the wood beams supporting the space for worship was noted. It was determined that repairing the structure would not be economical when everything involved was taken into account.

The original building was not equipped for the physically challenged, there was a definite lack of meeting space in the aging building and the growing population in the Byron suburb of London meant the church should be larger.

Clearly a new building was demanded. The last service in original church was held in January 1998. By April 1999 the first service was held in the present, much larger and much more traditional looking structure.

Winter in Canada means hot soup

In the middle of a Southwestern Ontario summer, one rarely thinks of steaming, hot soup. But in the middle of winter, in February, often the coldest month of the year, hot, homemade soup is just the ticket. This homemade potato and chedder cheese soup makes a perfect Canadian winter lunch when teamed with slices of avocado. The soup supplies instant warmth and the avocado fuels the body's furnace with its ample supply of heart healthy vegetable fat. After this lunch one's ready to finish digging out the driveway.

Cheers,
Rockinon

How much is five pounds of fat

Dietitian Jennifer-Anne Meneray holds five pounds "fat."

Did you ever wonder what five pounds of fat looks like? No? I'm not surprised.

February is international 'Heart Month'. A public education event was held at London Health Sciences Centre on Wednesday. It offered valuable information to those living with heart failure or seeking information on how to avoid this all-to-common disease.

Dietitian Jennifer-Anne Meneray showed the audience how much fat a person losing five pounds strips from their body. It's a lot, eh? Meneray said losing about fifteen pounds in a year is all a sensible person should lose in 12 months. Just think, fifteen pounds is three times the size of the simulated fat Meneray is holding.

If you drink a lot of soft drinks, cut one out a day. If you don't replace the calories with something else, and you make this a permanent lifestyle change — not just a dieting move — you will not only lose fifteen pounds in a year but you will keep those pounds off.

Cheers,
Rockinon 

Keep on Plowing

City sidewalks can be almost impassable after a Southwestern Ontario snow storm, and to hear a lot of Londoners tell it they are.

I don't recall sidewalk snowplows at all from my youth. I do recall sidewalks, especially those passing parks or vacant lots, being downright impossible to trudge through. For the most part, this doesn't happen today.

I don't expect instant service. I know I may have to contend with the reality of a bit of snow for awhile. Hey, that's winter in Canada. But, I appreciate the sidewalks being cleared, sometimes all in good time, by the city's little snowplows.

Cheers,
Rockinon

London District Energy

The building carries the simple name "London District Energy." But there is a rich story behind the simple name. This is a company with roots going back 130 years to 1880 when Canada's first district heating system was born.

Centralized steam plants with giant boilers providing steam to nearby commercial buildings were very popular in most major North American cities at the beginning of the twentieth century. The steam plants bought fuel, coal, at a discount unavailable to individual building owners. The savings were passed onto the steam plant customers. 

The introduction of inexpensive natural gas, spelled the end of many of the centralized systems as customers installed their own individual gas-fired heating systems.

Today, as the world explores ways to reduce our environmental footprint and improve energy efficiencies, centralized systems like London's still thriving historic gem are leading the way into the 21st century.

Originally a family-owned business, Cities Heating was located right in the city core. Time took its toll and the aging steam supply facility outgrew its usefulness a little more than a decade ago. The business was sold and a company known as Trigen Energy Corp. replaced Cities Heating in 1996. The plant was moved to the corner of Bathurst and Colborne Streets and modernized.

The plant was sold again and is now under the guidance of Fort Chicago. It has benefited from $38-million of improvements, including a 15,000-square-foot expansion. Generating traditional steam and chilled water, electricity has been added to the mix. The plant has a total thermal generating capacity of about 100MW, producing approximately 245,000 lbs/hour of steam and 4,200 tons of chilled water and adding about 18 megawatts of electricity to the Ontario power grid.

Many buildings in London are both heated and cooled by London District Energy thanks to an extensive and still growing distribution system; A new pipeline will add St. Joseph's Health Care to a system already serving The London Free Press, the London Convention Centre, Hilton London, Citi Plaza, City Hall and London Health Sciences Centre among many others.

Now you know why clouds of steam, especially in the cold of winter, are sometimes seen escaping from maintenance covers and road grates in London Ontario. A minor leak in the miles of underground piping can cause quite the cloud of water vapour.

And, if you are wondering what happened to the old Cities Heating Building, well, it sat derelict for years. In 2007 the London Ontario Live Arts Festival incorporated one wall of the building into a work of art. Currently, the building is being converted into apartments.

London District Energy

The picture is a bit of a bore but there is an interesting story here. This may stay up for two days as I gather information. First, don't panic at what appears to be smoke. It's not; It's steam.

This city heating business has roots going back to about 1880 in London, Ontario. This picture deserves more than just a simple post.

Cheers,
Rockinon

Stained glass windows

As a boy, I grew up in an area with very few stained glass windows. When my parents drove through London, as we did a number of times a year --- highway 401 was still to be carved through the southwestern Ontario farmland --- I always admired the many stained glass windows decorating homes in London.

It would be fun to do some research into stained glass windows. Were they expensive to install a hundred years ago? How many skilled craftspeople would have been involved in the creation of so many stained glass windows? Or did just a few artists work long hours decorating the older city homes?

This stained glass window is in an older home in the core. It's an area under constant threat of demolition to make way for apartment blocks or even parking lots.