The following is a joke article and not intended to be taken seriously... is it?
This weekend, Dain City residents will once again suffer at the hands of outsiders. I'm not talking about Port Colborne-bound heavy trucks slowly reducing our bridge to a deathtrap, nor do I mean thieving lowlifes moving into town and wreaking havoc. I'm not even talking about those blasted motorboat drivers trying to take over our canal. I'm referring to the most dreaded phenomenon that takes place in our quiet little hamlet: the bike race.
Yes, every year (and it feels like several times a year), our roads are closed to make way for the bike race. Both Forks Road and Kingsway are generally blocked off, creating delays for anyone who needs to take a trip into Welland proper.
It's bad enough that we deal with so many regattas over the spring and summer months. Each one of those results in our streets being clogged with parked cars, our canal lands being covered with spectators' garbage, and our air being filled with the sounds of air horns and unintelligible announcers. And on top of all that, we get a cop (or sometimes a simple security guard) sitting at the Forks & Kingsway crossroads all day, making sure everybody that passes by is a resident. Somehow it never seems suspicious to these guys that so many 'residents' immediately park on the side of Kingsway and walk right over the bridge to watch the race.
Anyway, that's bad enough as usual, but it's nothing compared to what's coming. Apparently they're actually going to close the roads this time, Forks Road at the bridge and Canal Bank at the railroad tracks. If that's true, it means that we'll all be trapped here in Dain City for the length of the race! Not that Dain City is a bad place to be all day, but just imagine what could happen. A small, friendly community suddenly isolated, with no way to get out? It sounds like the setup for a sequel to The Intruder Within.
How much longer must we put up with these injustices? I say it's time for the Dain City Revolution.
We all know how well seperatism worked for Quebec, so why can't it work for us? Let's become a new township and declare our independence! I've even prepared a handy list of stipulations to help us along the way:
- The Welland Dollar will continue to be accepted at all Dain City businesses, but at a variable exchange rate, which will be posted each morning on the service station sign.
- The former Deed's Place will be renovated and converted into our new City Hall.
- All pleasure craft passing through our section of the canal will have to pay a tariff at each distance marker. This will add a new element to all rowboat races, as the rowers will now have to compete to see who can pull out their loose change the fastest.
- We will continue to use Welland's municipal water supply, but we'll fix that spraying pipe at the end of Kingsway so that we're not paying for wasted water anymore.
- The new Dain City courthouse will be constructed at the Point, along with a prison in which to keep the car burglars. If we hurry, we can get it built before Welland finishes theirs. Also, ours won't have the ruins of a gas station across the street from it.
- The Forks Road and Kingsway crossroads will be replaced with a roundabout, in the center of which will be a bronze statue of our namesake, Joseph Dain.
- Finally, we'll start our own print newspaper. I'll do the news, the Dain City Convenience store can have a flyer, and we'll syndicate William Thomas' column for the humour section. 100% local, 100% quality.
So there you have it: the manifesto of the Dain City revolution. Vive le D. C. libre... or at least stop messing with our roads.
