Up in Smoke!

Today's blog is regarding an interesting article about a home in the community that was donated to the local fire department. It seems this house was donated for the fire department to practice a controlled burn on. This provides local firefighters with a real-life experience that you could not teach in any class.

The house fire that was initiated by the Metchosin Volunteer Fire Dept., came at a good time as they had just recruited 6 new firefighters. This type of training for a volunteer dept. is invaluable as they do not have the budget to afford such luxuries as local training sites. The closest facility is Otter Point out in the Sooke district which is a minimum of 30 minutes drive from the Metchosin Department. The costs and time associated with providing training in Sooke is obviously much higher than if everyone were to donate houses for training. I realize that this is an unlikely solution, but on island where several homes were built over 50 years ago and also not of the same quality, can we expect more properties to come up for this type of use?

I hope so, because the reality is that as you drive through Langford the majority of the residential units are older 2-3 bedroom homes, trailer parks, or brand new condos. The houses for the most part in disrepair, the trailer parks (which are the original Langford) are not very aesthetically pleasing, and the condos although quite nice are being bought by Victorians that can't afford to live in the city anymore. This lack of planning makes me sad. Sure new condos spruce up the downtown core of Langford but are they not just a new form of urban sprawl? I have seen several condos pushing the city limits driving people that may commute to Victoria for work to live further away from their destination. This may be a reasonable solution to the price of housing but what about the social costs to the environment which would require a further commute, more goods (because now you have a home to fill instead of a small apartment).

I think that the home donated in this case shows a commitment to the community that cannot be valued. The home owner wins because they burn their home legally, the fire dept. wins because they now have closer training facilities, and the new home that will built still remains in residential area but with a huge quality upgrade for the new buyer. A weird way to think of community participation......I agree but it certainly made me think.

http://www.bclocalnews.com/vancouver_island_south/goldstreamgazette/community/40792133.html