[sustran] fwd: Dinosaurs Against Fossil Fuels in Vancouver

[SUSTRAN Resource Centre]

>MEDIA ADVISORY
>
>For immediate release
>Friday, October 15, 1999
>
>T. RAAX FILES MAYORAL NOMINATION
>
>What:	T. Raax files Mayoralty Nomination Papers
>When: 	Friday, October 15, 1999, 12:30 pm
>Where: 	Office of the City Clerk, 3rd. Floor, Vancouver City Hall
>Why: 	Because, as every real dinosaur knows... extinction stinks.
>
>On Friday Oct. 15 at 12:30, T. Raax will file his nomination papers for the
>office of Mayor of Vancouver, with the support of the Dinosaurs Against
>Fossil Fuels (The Dino Party).  In compliance with the new City By-Law
>8071,  Raax will also submit his $100 nomination deposit, in cold hard
>cash -- nickels and dimes.
>
>Since the main plank of the Dino platform is sane transportation and
>opposition to burning of fossils (in the engines of cars), Raax will, of
>course, arrive at City Hall by bicycle. He will pay his deposit in change
>since, as he claims, City Council panders to the fossil-fuel-burning
>fat-cats while nickel-and-diming common reptiles who want to live more
>lightly on the earth.
>
>Calling themselves "the only party honest enough to admit it's out of
>date," the Dinos will run on a party platform which includes welding SUV's
>together to make decorative planters, relocating the Indy race to Fillup
>Owen's Shaughnessy neighbourhood, building bike lanes downtown, and
>fighting the fossil-burners' lobby to turn the Stanley Park Causeway into a
>speedway.
>
>On November 20, vote for a real dinosaur: Vote Dino.
>
>- 30 -
>
>
>For information or interviews contact: T. Raax (Hizzoner)
>via DAFF Press Attaché, Cybersaurus, at 618-5227, or via DAFF Media Flak,
>Carbonosaurus, at 688-4228.
>E-mail: dinomayor at yahoo.ca   Website: www.sustainability.com/dinos
>Press material and video clips are available.
>
>The Dinosaurs Against Fossil Fuels are sponsored in part  by the Vancouver
>Civic Neo-Paleozoic Association.


and a letter to the Editor of a local Vancouver newspaper:
>===============================
>To the editor:
>
>T. RAAX: REAL DINO, REAL ISSUES
>
>Recent articles in the Sun have impugned my candidacy directly and by
>inference, describing the Dinosaurs Against Fossil Fuels as "unknowns,"
>"jokers," and "nuisance candidates." Let me tell you, T.Raax and the Dino
>Party are for real.
>
>The Dinos have been actively communicating our fossilosophy of reduced auto
>addiction for two years. We have led hundreds of cyclists on rides through
>Stanley Park during Bike Week, and have provided thousands of commuters
>with information to help them stop killing the planet by burning our fossil
>forbearers in the engines of their cars.
>
>This city's fossil-burners and non-fossil-burners alike are smelling the
>smog and demanding alternatives, but City Council has been asleep at the
>wheel. The Dinos propose real alternatives: we want bike lanes on our city
>streets, so that cyclists can ride safely. We want bus lanes so that
>transit users can get to work on time. And we want a moratorium on building
>and widening roads, so that fewer cars can clog our streets.
>
>These are what us Dinos call "peanut brain" solutions -- no-brainers that
>even the thickest mammals should be able to grasp. Every other progressive
>city in the world is enacting such measures, but Vancouver seems stuck in
>the past.
>
>Instead of taking simple measures to reduce car addiction, the city is
>seriously considering widening the Stanley Park Causeway and the access
>road to Granville Island, so that cars can drive faster and crash harder,
>resulting in even bigger traffic jams. And meanwhile, the city's current
>(largely progressive) transportation plan is slowly fossilizing in the City
>Archives.
>
>Auto addiction is a major cause of global warming and human grumpiness. The
>Dino Party is trying to focus this campaign on improving the livability of
>this city and heading off human extinction. The fact that the City Hall
>oiligarchy considers candidates who focus on real issues to be a "nuisance"
>is a clear indication that we've hit a raw nerve. The truth is that the
>dinosaurs who currently sit on City Council are  imposters, because every
>real dinosaur knows that extinction stinks. That's why, on November 20,
>we're asking the people who love this city to vote for the Dino Party: a
>REAL dinosaur and a real party.
>
>T. Raax
>Candidate, City of Vancouver Mayor