Canada Post is there to deliver mail

In reply to your editorial about the change of postal service and rural delivery (Feb. 13 edition of the Sentinel):

Much to my regret, the only MP who seems genuinely interested in restoring the rural mail system to the individual mailboxes is and was Lui Temelkovski, whom I have contacted several times regarding this issue.

The private contractor, then delivering the rural mail, didn't seem to have an issue with the traffic then. However, after they became permanent employees, suddenly the task became far too dangerous. The traffic was too heavy - I counted one vehicle every five or 10 minutes on Keele Street.

Solution: Place delivery of rural mail back to private contractors. Place present staff, now entitled to generous pensions from Canada Post, to desk jobs. These are less hazardous, but there might be the hazard of carpal tunnel syndrome.

The single purpose of Canada Post was and should still be the delivery of mail to its customers, not the convenience of its employees.

Muscle pain, you mentioned. Don't make me laugh! To my knowledge, Honda at Alliston builds vans with left and right-hand drive.

Compare the muscle pain to the staff running our waste disposal trucks. Solution: Let these people bring their refuse to the dump themselves.

Put yourself in the boots of our snowplow operators. Talk to them about eyestrain and hazards.

Our officials talk continually about traffic calming, cutting fuel consumption, about global warming, our obligation to our children, etc.

Let's see now: Previously, one van and one driver delivering mail 300 days per year, consuming 10 litres of gas per day equals 3,000 litres of fuel per annum. Now let's see: the new system pumps between 800 and 1,200 cars on rural roads 250 days a year, using one to three litres per trip to pick up mail per day. The range is from - 800 times 250 times one litre equals 200,000 litres, to 1,200 times 250 times one litre equals 300,000 litres.

Fuel wastage, dumped, useless, due to the failure of the postal services to do their duty. They surely make us do our part in emissions, doing our part in destroying our precious, glorious, blue planet.
Kurt Erzberger,
Kettleby