 News Index |
|
FEATURED AD
|
|
|
|
Letter to the Editor
|
|
|
|
Police / G20 Before and After
|
Critics assail lack of vision in G20 plans
As The Bulletin goes to press, the forecast for security arrangements in the Downtown area for the G20 Summit on June 26 and June 27 remains “subject to change without notice.”
A May 27 press conference at Toronto Police headquarters revealed details of the 2-zone control area centring on the Metro Convention Centre. Mainly, the announcement confirms what had already become known piecemeal over the previous month.
An outer, unfenced, traffic control zone will extend from King St. to Queen’s Quay and from Yonge St. to Spadina Ave. The 400-series highways, the Gardiner Expressway, the QEW and Lake Shore Blvd. will not be closed during the summit, although Hwy. 427 and the Gardiner will be shut down periodically to accommodate motorcades.
An inner, fenced high security zone will extend from Bay St. to Blue Jays Way. Its northern boundary will be Wellington St. E. The southern perimeter of the zone goes from Bay St. west along the middle of Front to York streets, down York, west on Bremner, south on Lower Simcoe, west on Lakeshore and north again between the CN Tower and the Rogers Centre.
Construction will begin June 7 and will continue round the clock until completion. The fences will be similar to the chain-link barriers used during the Indy car race in July, according to Toronto Police sources. No razor wire will be used.
Union Station, the Air Canada Centre, and the Rogers Centre will be located outside of the perimeter.
Residents and employees who live or work inside this zone will require passes to enter. There is only one residential building (33 University Ave.) located inside the security fencing perimeter. Residents in all other buildings do not require security passes unless they are employed by a business inside the fenced zone.
Employees should contact their employer to clarify their status. Property managers will be notified if the boundaries for the fencing change.
Adam Vaughan’s office has been very active in distributing community information updates by email bulletin.
Vaughan and McConnell hosted community information meetings on April 29. The fluidity of the situation is highlighted by the fact that most of the questions and concerns raised at those meetings centred on the choice of Trinity-Bellwoods Park as an assembly site for protestors. Apparently security planners had not been aware of how closely integrated park and neighbourhood have become in recent years, because the protest site has since been shifted to Queen’s Park North, which is more isolated from residential neighbourhoods.
Early plans showed that the security agencies were not quite up to speed on local conditions, probably due to haste—the summit was announced Dec. 7—and Olympic overload on the agencies. Planners have admitted that until very recently they were unaware that a number of private daycare centres operate in the commercial buildings within the perimeter and would be affected by security measures.
Also on May 27, Vaughan excoriated the federal government for its announcement that compensation will not be paid for property damage sustained as a result of unrest or vandalism during the summit. A May 21 statement from the G20 foreign affairs liaison unit noted that “these types of damages are insurable under normal insurance coverage.”
“The federal government has reneged on what we thought was a commitment to pay for damage done during the G20,” Vaughan said. “So storeowners, condominiums, private homeowners, all within the private security zone, if their windows are broken or their cars are damaged or any other property damaged as a result of protests or God knows what, the federal government has said they won’t compensate people.”
Advice to our readers: this is one event you want to miss unless you absolutely have to be Downtown on June 25, 26 and 27.
The G8/G20 Integrated Security Unit has created Twitter and Facebook accounts to provide updates about traffic delays due to motorcades, protests, marches, and other G20 related events both before and during the summit. People can sign up to receive updates through their website at www.g8-g20isu.ca.
|
2010-06-03 20:43:23
|
|
| Poll question |
| Advertisement |
|
.gif){kind=logo}
