Latest / Kvetch & Release / 610 CKTB | Grit vs. Spectacle: How Geography Shaped Windsor & Niagara

Transcript

610 CKTB | Grit vs. Spectacle: How Geography Shaped Windsor & Niagara · Kvetch & Release

• 0:00
  Speaker 1: Lid Key has a take good morning, Gene.
• 0:03
  Speaker 2: Hey, John, you told me that today, the tenth of
• 0:06
  Speaker 2: July is a day of historic humiliation, humiliation for a
• 0:13
  Speaker 2: town near Toronto, and apparently it's all Windsor's fault. Okay,
• 0:16
  Speaker 2: So what did Windsor do to the poor people of
• 0:19
  Speaker 2: Whitby back of all years eighteen forty seven on today's date,
• 0:25
  Speaker 2: July tenth?
• 0:27
  Speaker 1: Okay, let me set the scene for you, Gene. So
• 0:29
  Speaker 1: it's the muddy shores of Lake Ontario. It was a
• 0:32
  Speaker 1: fledging settlement that's standing proud, the timber buildings, relatively new,
• 0:36
  Speaker 1: industrious people. They had a brand new post office standing
• 0:39
  Speaker 1: at the center of town. But something was wrong. Deep
• 0:42
  Speaker 1: in the wilteredness. A phantom was haunting their mailbags. You see.
• 0:46
  Speaker 1: An early landlowner named John Scatting. He christened the village
• 0:49
  Speaker 1: Windsor after his grand estate back in England. But down
• 0:53
  Speaker 1: here by Detroit, my Windsor was already growing at an
• 0:57
  Speaker 1: incredible speed and absolutely dominating them maps, and the nineteenth
• 1:01
  Speaker 1: century postal service just completely threw up its hands in defeat.
• 1:05
  Speaker 1: Month after month, the pioneers in Windsor Whitby would gather
• 1:10
  Speaker 1: at the post office, only to find that their critical
• 1:12
  Speaker 1: business deeds, their shipping manifests, and even their scandalous, ink
• 1:15
  Speaker 1: stained romantic love letters were vanished. They were hijacked by
• 1:19
  Speaker 1: the geography of the Deep South, and they were sent
• 1:21
  Speaker 1: straight to our docks down here in Windsor, across from Detroit.
• 1:25
  Speaker 1: So on July tenth of eighteen forty seven, the madness
• 1:27
  Speaker 1: reached a boiling point. A crowd of furious mail deprived
• 1:30
  Speaker 1: citizens all packed tightly into the smoke filled quarters of
• 1:33
  Speaker 1: the scriptures in the tavern with tankards of ail in hand.
• 1:37
  Speaker 1: They wept, they raged, and they completely surrendered to my
• 1:40
  Speaker 1: Windsor's geographic dominance. They voted to strip away their own identity.
• 1:45
  Speaker 1: They voted to rebrand their town as Whitby instead, just
• 1:49
  Speaker 1: so they could finally get their newspapers on time to
• 1:51
  Speaker 1: check the lottery numbers. Imagine being so powerful down here
• 1:55
  Speaker 1: in Windsor, Ontario that you were able to force a
• 1:57
  Speaker 1: down four hundred kilometers away to hold the Tburn Summit
• 2:01
  Speaker 1: just to escape our shadow. Windsor has not been as
• 2:04
  Speaker 1: strong ever since.
• 2:07
  Speaker 2: Okay, I've never heard the story before. So Windsor stole
• 2:11
  Speaker 2: a town's identity and their mail in eighteen forty seven.
• 2:15
  Speaker 1: But we didn't steal it. We just outgrew them.
• 2:19
  Speaker 2: Okay, but I hear you of the theory that the
• 2:22
  Speaker 2: ghosts of those pioneers are getting the revenge on Windsor.
• 2:26
  Speaker 1: Oh, it's a spiritual curse, Geene. There's no other explanation.
• 2:29
  Speaker 1: So yeah, we grew faster than them taking their namesake,
• 2:33
  Speaker 1: I suppose, and now they're taking our mail. Think about
• 2:36
  Speaker 1: this ever since Canada Post closed our local Windsor storting
• 2:39
  Speaker 1: facility a few years back. If you mail a letter
• 2:43
  Speaker 1: in Windsor to another Windsor address, it doesn't just go
• 2:46
  Speaker 1: down the street. It gets loaded onto a truck driven
• 2:49
  Speaker 1: two hundred kilometers up the four to oh one to London,
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  Speaker 1: sordid processed, put back on a truck driven two hundred
• 2:54
  Speaker 1: kilometers back down to Windsor. This is the most passive, aggressive,
• 2:58
  Speaker 1: dastardly Canadian revenge plot. We still get our mail down here,
• 3:02
  Speaker 1: it's just taking weeks to travel a massive loop, which
• 3:05
  Speaker 1: is exactly what we did to those poor Whitby pioneers
• 3:07
  Speaker 1: one hundred and eighty years ago. The universe is balancing
• 3:11
  Speaker 1: the scales, Gene.
• 3:13
  Speaker 2: Okay, So you're talking to me, I'm in Niagara, where
• 3:16
  Speaker 2: it's officially by the way Nikola Tesla day. Now you've
• 3:20
  Speaker 2: mentioned we have a bit of a little Brothers syndrome
• 3:23
  Speaker 2: because we love extreme spectacles and dangerous stunts to compete
• 3:27
  Speaker 2: with Toronto. Are you saying that Windsor is superiors to us?
• 3:32
  Speaker 1: Oh, I wouldn't say that. I say this all with love, Gene,
• 3:34
  Speaker 1: but look at your track record there. Niagara has always
• 3:37
  Speaker 1: been completely obsessed with dangerous, extreme spectacles, from daredevils and
• 3:42
  Speaker 1: barrels over the falls to there was that time that
• 3:45
  Speaker 1: you almost incinerated the future King of England, Prince Albert Edward,
• 3:48
  Speaker 1: with chemical flares on a wooden platform back in eighteen sixty.
• 3:52
  Speaker 1: I mean, the falls themselves are this roaring natural marvel
• 3:55
  Speaker 1: that forces everyone around them that chase greatness. But I
• 3:58
  Speaker 1: think that being so close to Toronto does give you
• 4:01
  Speaker 1: a little bit of a little brother syndrome where you're
• 4:03
  Speaker 1: constantly screaming look at me. We don't have that in ourselves, Gene.
• 4:09
  Speaker 1: We don't care about impressing Toronto, and we know that
• 4:12
  Speaker 1: we can't compete with Detroit, so we're perfectly content sitting
• 4:16
  Speaker 1: down here at the end of the four oh one
• 4:17
  Speaker 1: hanging out with Detroit, being completely alone in our little
• 4:21
  Speaker 1: end of the corner of the province. We don't need
• 4:23
  Speaker 1: giant like shows like the Falls. We're just content building
• 4:26
  Speaker 1: our cars and complaining about the provincial and national capitals.
• 4:31
  Speaker 2: Okay, so Windsor is content just being alone at the
• 4:33
  Speaker 2: end of the four to one. But let's look at
• 4:36
  Speaker 2: the contrast between our regions. Why do you think that
• 4:39
  Speaker 2: Windsor became so focused on practical border town grit. Well,
• 4:43
  Speaker 2: we here in Niagara went the root of trying to
• 4:45
  Speaker 2: capture lightning in a bottle.
• 4:48
  Speaker 1: I think it comes down to geography and destiny. Our
• 4:51
  Speaker 1: identity was forged out of sheer survival logistics manufacturing. We
• 4:56
  Speaker 1: became the ultimate border gateway, the underground railroad US, and
• 5:00
  Speaker 1: the automotive heart of the country because our relationship is
• 5:03
  Speaker 1: with the midwestern muscle of Detroit and the Midwest Michigan,
• 5:07
  Speaker 1: Midwestern United States. I mean we deal in iron, steel
• 5:10
  Speaker 1: and horsepower. Niagara it was a different beast just by nature,
• 5:14
  Speaker 1: you're handed a different hand of cards. Excuse me, when
• 5:19
  Speaker 1: you live next to one of the wonders of the world,
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  Speaker 1: your entire economy and culture become about capturing awe, so
• 5:25
  Speaker 1: Windsor was about the practical grid of moving the world,
• 5:27
  Speaker 1: and Niagara's destiny was always trying to capture lightning in
• 5:31
  Speaker 1: a bottle. You guys cater to the imagination, and I
• 5:34
  Speaker 1: think that's incredible. It's beautiful and look at what it's
• 5:37
  Speaker 1: yielded all you guys. I mean, you've got one of
• 5:39
  Speaker 1: the most incredible regions in the country.
• 5:43
  Speaker 2: Now you hit on something interesting about today. Being Nikola
• 5:47
  Speaker 2: Tesla day, he was a total outsider. Why do you
• 5:50
  Speaker 2: think I took a foreigner Tesla to come to the
• 5:53
  Speaker 2: Niagara Peninsula to actually ignore red tape and build the
• 5:57
  Speaker 2: modern electrical grid. Well, let's face the Canadian history is
• 6:02
  Speaker 2: full of committees.
• 6:04
  Speaker 1: I mean, this is the thing, right, I mean, this
• 6:06
  Speaker 1: is this is peak outsider coming into North America with
• 6:11
  Speaker 1: a completely different mind sake. When Tesla came to America,
• 6:16
  Speaker 1: he had a signed letter from the European Edison Company,
• 6:19
  Speaker 1: Thomas and Thomas Edison's company that said, hey, this guy's
• 6:22
  Speaker 1: pretty good. He got over to America, showed the letter
• 6:25
  Speaker 1: to Edison and Edison and said, hey, if you want
• 6:28
  Speaker 1: to come work for me, you have to abandon your
• 6:29
  Speaker 1: crazy hairbrain scheme about alternating current. And you know, he
• 6:34
  Speaker 1: worked from for a year and then he quit the job.
• 6:36
  Speaker 1: He went and worked with Westinghouse and the rest is history.
• 6:39
  Speaker 1: But if a local committee had been left in charge
• 6:41
  Speaker 1: to harnessing Niagara Falls, we'd still be waiting on environmental
• 6:44
  Speaker 1: assessments today, Jean, I mean, the public consultants would be
• 6:46
  Speaker 1: raking up the bills. But I mean, look at Saint Catharines.
• 6:49
  Speaker 1: You guys had an incredible streetcar system built in nineteen
• 6:53
  Speaker 1: twenty four, but the whole thing was paralyzed because the
• 6:55
  Speaker 1: city and the transit company spent years arguing who was
• 6:58
  Speaker 1: responsible to pour the Ashville. So I mean, we can't
• 7:01
  Speaker 1: allow zoning committees to strangle the future. Which is why
• 7:04
  Speaker 1: it took someone like Tesla to show up with a
• 7:06
  Speaker 1: childhood dream of looking at the Niagara Falls on a
• 7:09
  Speaker 1: postcard and thinking, why don't I put a giant wheel
• 7:12
  Speaker 1: under that thing. He completely ignored the colonial form and
• 7:16
  Speaker 1: triplicate mentality, and even the American idea of trying to
• 7:21
  Speaker 1: pull together alliances, and he just built it. He understood
• 7:24
  Speaker 1: what we always seem to forget here, which is that
• 7:26
  Speaker 1: it's infinitely better to innovate first, shoot the lightning bolts,
• 7:30
  Speaker 1: and then beg for forgiveness from the bureaucrats later.
• 7:33
  Speaker 2: We're right. So final question. So here we are July tenth,
• 7:37
  Speaker 2: the big anniversary. So your final take. What's the ultimate
• 7:40
  Speaker 2: lesson here for Ontario? How do we stop waiting for permission,
• 7:44
  Speaker 2: get past the red tape, and finally just build the wheel.
• 7:49
  Speaker 1: I think the lesson is that we need to stop
• 7:50
  Speaker 1: being so deeply paternalistic and waiting for permission. I mean,
• 7:55
  Speaker 1: we've got the grit in both Windsor and Niagara, We've
• 7:58
  Speaker 1: got the raw power in both of our aras, but
• 8:00
  Speaker 1: as Canadians were terrified of making moves until someone in
• 8:03
  Speaker 1: a capital city gives us a rubber stamp telling us
• 8:06
  Speaker 1: that it's okay to do something. Tesla is a massive
• 8:09
  Speaker 1: point of pride up in your region. You've got a
• 8:12
  Speaker 1: monument to him at Boulevard at Plaza, But lighting up
• 8:15
  Speaker 1: the falls isn't enough. If we really want to honor
• 8:18
  Speaker 1: that spirit today, we've got to stop setting up these committees.
• 8:21
  Speaker 1: We've got to stop letting transit systems get bogged down
• 8:24
  Speaker 1: by petty disputes and have grander vision. We need to
• 8:27
  Speaker 1: start channeling bold, unapologetic imagination, the likes of which Tesla
• 8:32
  Speaker 1: brought from across the ocean. So let's stop filling out
• 8:35
  Speaker 1: the forums, let's drop the red tape, and let's just
• 8:38
  Speaker 1: finally build the darn wheel. Geene.
• 8:42
  Speaker 2: Yeah, and the wheel right now are two oil pipelines.
• 8:45
  Speaker 2: Another great take, Thank you so much. The rimo is
• 8:50
  Speaker 2: John Litkey. He always has a take and they're always fascinating.