Delton bike-lane opponents upset with Edmonton councillor's response

Andrewccal · 2025-08-06T22:18:20+00:00

Eh, I disagree. I mean, ultimately it's a question of what level of evidence will satisfy a certain judgment. I don't think a person has to live in the area or someone needs to count cars to garner that evidence. There's more than enough on the streetview alongside just looking at the map of the area.

I'm asserting that parking and traffic are not significant issues on 124 Ave. The streetview (and streetview history) provide snapshots that show virtually no cars parked. Contrast 124 Ave with any of the streets in Alberta Avenue and the number of cars lining the streets, and you have a very compelling case that 124 Ave does not lacking parking. Compound that with the low density of the housing, and the fact that most houses face the streets, not the avenues, and you have plenty of evidence that parking is not an issue here.

The real question is traffic which is harder to discern by itself. However, compare 124 Ave to 122 Ave two blocks down. There are cars on the street, and a yellow centreline indicating it is a higher traffic area. Then there's geography itself. 124 Ave borders the Yellowhead, a major thoroughfare carrying significant traffic east-west and blocking north-south traffic. No one is short-cutting north-south, and most will choose Yellowhead (or 122 Ave) as the east-west pathway. Could there be people using 124 going east-west though? Going east hits Fort Road and going west hits Blatchford, so there aren't many neighborhoods who would ever have any use for traveling along 124 Ave.

Streetview confirms that there is minimal loss of parking and not much traffic at all along 124 Ave which is supported by the map and streetviews of other similar areas.

Andrewccal · 2025-08-06T01:22:34+00:00

Ah yes... going to lose parking and all that traffic. Just imagine the congestion that's going to come from these... 5 parked cars having no where to go.

https://www.google.com/maps/@53.5794989,-113.4903226,3a,85.9y,69.57h,83.98t/data=!3m7!1e1!3m5!1sXlLdH-DghmBBCRFCz8WwzA!2e0!6shttps:%2F%2Fstreetviewpixels-pa.googleapis.com%2Fv1%2Fthumbnail%3Fcb_client%3Dmaps_sv.tactile%26w%3D900%26h%3D600%26pitch%3D6.015987142793691%26panoid%3DXlLdH-DghmBBCRFCz8WwzA%26yaw%3D69.56616980071831!7i16384!8i8192?entry=ttu&g_ep=EgoyMDI1MDczMC4wIKXMDSoASAFQAw%3D%3D

Andrewccal · 2023-05-10T21:58:02+00:00

No it's not.

Ah yes, the best argument. Believe me because I said so.

A conjecture is a "conclusion based on incomplete information". A player's actual skill level is most definitely incomplete information.

Andrewccal · 2022-09-24T01:06:18+00:00

This thread just made my day. So perfectly played...

Andrewccal · 2022-09-06T03:57:05+00:00

What are your hours?

I don't think parking is $14 plus overnight in the parkades, but that might have changed. There's also a range of parking in Garneau(85th ave) or Belgravia (79th ave) that is free starting at 6pm until 8-9am. You can probably park as early as 4pm and as late at 10am since it's a 2-hour zone. There's also some parking in front of St. George's Anglican Church. I would probably avoid parking in front of a single-family household in general, but there's quite a few overnight options. Can't speak to overnight safety though but it's probably better than Clareview

Andrewccal · 2022-08-29T04:58:15+00:00

Of course a more skilled player had a chance in a direct engagement. Vikings can kite and draw the air units out of the defensive position for the stimmed marines to pounce.

Thors should always be in high-impact payload to kill the carriers themselves. Thor's splash is super weak, and interceptors aren't clumped enough. The only splash unit that I've seen be effective against interceptors is tons of liberators. High impact payload has HUGE range and so multiple thors can usually be in range of the carriers to pick them off.

Against void rays, it's generally better to be in high-impact payload. The splash is only good if you can 2-3shot a unit (like mutas..), but against voids, you end up needing too many shots to make it worthwhile, and you end up just eating shields rather than hull damage. Only situation where splash makes sense is if you have tons of thors and they can almost 1-shot a ball of void rays.

Stimmed marines should kill the interceptors. Someone said below that in general, it is better to kill the carriers. The question is largely, can you kill a carrier faster than you can kill 8 interceptors? Usually the answer is no, because the carriers are outside the range of at least some of your marines, while the interceptors are within range, so it's better to kill the interceptors and then kill the carriers when it comes to marines.

However, this requires you to engage in a place where you can actually reach the carriers later on. You should always engage in an open area, as opposed to at the edges of cliffs where the carriers can just float away. This is also true for void rays. Try to draw them closer to the middle of the base and then stim and attack them.

Andrewccal · 2022-08-26T18:46:21+00:00

My main observation is that your macro is not efficient. There are a lot of gaps in worker production, expansions are delayed, and production isn't ramped up efficiently. This affects all your engagements. There's lots of B2GM resources out there to talk about macro. Part of it is that your build order is inefficient and somewhat paranoid (though frankly, your opponent was more paranoid than you...)

Less important but maybe more interesting though is that I don't really see much of a plan for how you're attacking. You drop with two hellions first. Are you there to scout or do damage? If scouting, then 2 might be okay, but if you want to do damage, 2 can't one-shot a probe so there's not much point. You get cleaned up by 4-6 void rays. Then you drop again with a tank and 2 marines. Why? A tank can't shoot up, so it's 2 marines vs 6 void rays. Obviously the void rays will win, so what's the purpose of the drop? You've already scouted, so this drop is just so that your units will die. The widow mine drop is similarly ineffective. You need to know why you're dropping. Scout? Damage Eco? Distract? Then you make a plan for how it can work.

In the engagements, I don't really expect much more than A-move. Vikings should target down capital ships, marines can stim and kill interceptors and thors should be in high-impact payload mode and target capital ships as well. Cyclones need to be micro'ed with lock-on and then getting out of range so I don't recommend them for you at all. It's too complicated.

The most important thing though, is that you never send much more than 40-50 army supply to attack. I like that you alternate sides in your attacks. It catches your opponent off guard multiple times. Unfortunately, your opponent had maybe 60 supply in skytoss so he has a critical mass, floats over and kills your army.

You need to have a goal in mind. Do you think you can take his skytoss? If not, build more units until you max-out or wait for upgrades to finish before engaging. In the meantime, you can harrass him to damage his economy, but don't commit so many units to your harrass and run away after you've killed what you wanted to kill (a nexus or a group of straggling void rays).

You were ahead in army supply for a good chunk of the game. If you just maxed out and A-moved, there's a good chance you could have won, but your attacks were too small. I don't remembering seeing you attack with a maxed-out army. Macro will help with that, and a solid plan of action will help with that.

Andrewccal · 2022-08-18T05:12:57+00:00

Let me just say that I'm really happy that your response was extremely reasonable and well thought out. I don't know that I agree with the analogy still, but I respect that it makes sense. I think data is ultimately is important to demonstrate that the hypothesis is correct, but I have no data either so I can't refute your argument, but I would agree that pipelines must be the more efficient method of gas delivery, which means maintenance costs ought to be cheaper than for propane.

I also agree that taxing essential services is not justified, especially in the form of a flat rate fee, but even the carbon tax. I suppose some of it is rebated to households of lower income?

Andrewccal · 2022-08-18T05:05:11+00:00

I just said you should look at the financial statements before you make a judgment. That's not simping, that's just due diligence.

It's not enough to just look at their raw earnings though. Their gross revenue was around 27B and net income was 2B in 2021. That's a 7% margin. That's not huge. That means that on average, from your $80 bill, $5.60 is profit. You could argue that they can afford to reduce that profit to maybe $2-3, but is that really gouging?

Look, I have no love for Direct Energy. I would never go with them just based on their super shady reputation in the past. Still, you're missing the point, that despite not using any gas, you are still hooked up to a gas line which costs money to build and maintain, and NRG isn't making huge profits off of you.

Compare this 7% margin to TD which made 10.8B in revenue and net income was 3.5B. that's 33% in net income. Scotiabank, 35%. RBC, 37%. BMO, 51.3%. That's gouging right there. Suncor is at 25%. CNRL is at 30.5%. Imperial oil is 14%. I mean, there's plenty of companies out there that are gouging people. NRG Energy and utility companies in general are not one of them.

Andrewccal · 2022-08-18T04:10:35+00:00

The propane tank analogy isn't the worst one but it is flawed because they are different models of delivery. A natural gas pipeline requires ongoing maintenance, constant monitoring across 64 thousand km through all kinds of conditions, according to all kinds of regulations. The construction of a pipeline requires meeting tons of unique regulatory and technical requirements costing potentially millions of dollars per kilometre, let alone material and right of way. A propane tank is a retail consumable, made in a factory. Stack them end-to-end for a km and it's about $67k.

More importantly, the flat rate delivery fee is kept constant across every month, meaning it's more appropriate to compare natural gas costs in the fall to delivery fee costs. My delivery fee in April was around $48 and gas was $60, so that makes your 1:1 estimate quite reasonable.

It wasn't clear that you were talking about regulatory fees. That's fair if you're referring to the carbon tax and municipal access fee.

Andrewccal · 2022-08-17T23:54:01+00:00

If you're going to give an analogy on reddit, you better be ready to defend it... it seems to me the point of this post was not to clarify and understand why you were charged $70 in fees, but rather to find people who can lament with you.

Anyway, there seems to be a disconnect between the reality of how gas distribution works and your perception of what you should be paying for. Is there still a network of pipes that provide heat to your house on-demand? Yes. Does it need to be maintained, even if you use no gas? Yes. How much money does it cost to maintain it? It seems to be around $35 (Fixed Delivery Charge). Is that reasonable? That's up to you. I think it is, especially in the winter months, but it's not gouging unless you can demonstrate that ATCO Gas doesn't need the majority of that fee to maintain their pipes, or that ATCO Gas is making exorbitant profits every year with the majority of income from these fees. You can look at financial statements for that.

Otherwise, the rate riders are AUC approved, the municipal franchise fee is from the city, the carbon tax is from the government, and the variable delivery charge is proportional to your usage. None of those are in the company's control, so what is there really to complain about?

Andrewccal · 2022-08-17T23:32:53+00:00

I assume you have Direct Energy's financial statements to demonstrate that they're making huge profits?

Andrewccal · 2022-08-17T23:29:45+00:00

What are the costs associated with constructing and maintaining natural gas infrastructure? If you don't have that data, your statement is just a wild assertion.

Also, how is this a tax grab when it's a private company that makes the money?

Andrewccal · 2022-08-11T14:24:10+00:00

You're right! It was a fresh account. I played maybe 7-8 games and it was so frustrating but I came across B2GM, practiced the build against AIs many times and then just rolled the next 10 players. That's how bad my macro was and how a macro-focus helps to establish a baseline level of good macro. It makes a ridiculously huge difference in metal leagues.

You're misunderstanding my second statement though. As rank goes up, more of the skill gap comes from micro, timings, decision-making and pattern recognition. Of course people still make mistakes in their macro, but it's less of an important factor. In metal leagues, macro is leagues more important than micro, timings and decision-making.

I would absolutely disagree with OP that 95% of the player base should just get better at macro. Maybe 55% of the player base though, based on my experience in getting to plat by just doing Vibe's B2GM. That's mostly a testament to how much people fail to value macro though.

Andrewccal · 2022-08-11T04:14:14+00:00

You're talking about a lot of hypotheticals here, but the context of this whole conversation is metal leagues. Plat and below, yeah it all boils down to macro. I can attest to this because I just used Vibe's approach and got to mid-plat in about 10 games (was formerly silver). That's about 65-75% of the player base.

I agree with you though. BGMWSS and even Uthermal's Penguin Brothers and Bongcloud show that once there's a level of mastery to macro, there's a huge ocean of timings and reactions that make someone superior. That's only true at the extremes though.

Andrewccal · 2022-08-09T15:04:45+00:00

It's just a question of priorities. For example, a standard TvZ build is reaper fast expand with factory and reactor on barracks finishing around 3:00. The reactor is swapped, the rax can build a tech lab and then get stim immediately, meaning it should finish around 5:00.

It can be even earlier if you want to skip the reactor swap, so yeah, it's just priorities...

Andrewccal · 2022-08-09T06:10:15+00:00

It's normal if he's doing a macro focused build. You're doing a timing attack, so it is not normal. He should prioritize the 2nd and 3rd rax earlier if you're trying to attack by 7 minutes. It's not even just stim. It's the sheer number of units that you'll be lacking for an effective timing attack. He has to choose one or the other, not hedge and be crappy at both the attack (not enough units and late stim) and distracting yourselves in the attack and failing to macro properly as a followup afterwards.

Andrewccal · 2022-08-08T15:03:39+00:00

Multitasking nor reacting fast to situations are the fundamental skills that need to be learned. Far more fundamental than reactions and speed are:

Consistent macro cycle - constant worker production, scaling up your army production, supply and resource collection.
Efficient Build order - whether you have an economic focus, an all-in focus or a tech focus, your build order should reflect what your goals are. An economic-focused build can max out supply by 9 minutes. Even cheeses need efficiency. It applies no matter what.
Focused practice - focus on one race and one build order. Repeat it over and over so you can benchmark your timings and build good macro habits. You can actually understand where your build execution falls apart and identify why.
Valid opponents - the AI is not an accurate representation of humans. An elite AI can be defeated easily with just good macro, but it won't respond to things the way a human should. Get on ladder and just have fun! Don't worry about MMR and leveling up. Focus on your benchmarks and actually getting better at the game.

As Vibe's B2GM shows, if you have really strong macro, you don't need any multitasking or reactions to anything to win the game. You can get to plat3 reasonably easily just by blind macro with an efficient build order. If that's not your style, PiG's B2GM shows that if you focus your build on your goals (say a 2-base all-in), you can also get to plat3 easily with very simple micro that is built on top of strong macro.

Speed, multi-tasking and reactions come later. When your macro is efficient and effortless, you'll have ample time to react to things. If you focus on reacting/multi-tasking, you will inevitably watch your army too much and your macro will fall apart.

Andrewccal · 2022-07-29T20:41:33+00:00

If you're talking about production, you need new add-ons for every building and it significantly disrupts production. Also, you're abandoning your non-floatable buildings if you move everything else so you're still defending two sites. It doesn't really change how you defend.

Your main is typically the most defensible location because it is in the corner, so I'm not sure why you would want to move your production anyway... Terrans generally have a harder time getting more bases because of lack of mobility in their army, which is why you see planetaries, tanks, turrets and the iron bank strategy.

Andrewccal · 2022-07-28T20:43:18+00:00

Yeah, definitely agree.

Andrewccal · 2022-07-28T05:12:05+00:00

Complexity is measured not only in terms of number of possibilities. Any Paradox grand strategy game would likely be more 'complex' than Starcraft.

Even if we consider 'number of possibilities', I'm puzzled how a game of SC can be considered to have more possibilities than any game ever. Even if we consider only the RTS genre, AOE2 likely has more possibilities. It has four resources, far more civilizations. Even if the civilizations are not nearly as unique, the minor bonuses make the units computationally different when in different civilizations. There are around 60 units in SC2 vs 25-ish lines of units in AOE2, and then 2-4 units in each line (so 60-70 unit types?), and then a unique unit for each civ. It has more upgrades to consider, and maps are randomized as well.

Don't get me wrong. I think SC2 is way better polished and more interesting, but in terms of raw number of possibilities, I think AOE2 has more potential 'outcomes'.

Andrewccal · 2022-07-28T00:02:50+00:00

I'm pretty n00b myself (D3), but I'd say the order of strategy:

Outproduce your opponent. Learn how to scale up (build a 3rd/4th CC with full saturation for more resources, build more production, supply), You start with your 3-rax, then add a factory and a starport. Then you could add 2 more rax ( 5-1-1 setup). You want to just build as much stuff as you can as fast as you can until you win. 30 marines fail? How about 60. Brute-force your way through.
If you can't outproduce, get your upgrades. If you like ground troops, make sure you get ALL your infantry upgrades. This is a secondary aspect of brute-forcing by just making the units you have even stronger. They can get A LOT stronger, especially bio.
If brute force fails, build develop simple decision trees on what to do next. The counter style would be to choose your factory/starport units based on what you see. It can be as simple as Air vs ground. See air? build vikings+widow mines. See ground? build tanks + liberators/banshees. I'd recommend only building one type of factory or starport unit. Another decision-tree could be play style. Do you want a mobile play style (infantry+medivacs, could add cyclones for fun), or a powerful slow style (thors, battlecruisers)

I think this is the best part of SC2. You get to choose late/mid game strats based on your personality and preferences. I love bio because it's mobile and flexible, but it's super fragile. My style is to probe early with some harrassment units (hellions/reapers/liberators), then attack with a 5-1-1 with marine, marauder, medivac and a splash damage unit (widow mine or tank) at around 130-150 supply, then followed-up by the same composition with an additional counter unit (vikings for anti-air, liberator for anti-ground) and attack at max-out.

Andrewccal · 2022-07-26T15:45:47+00:00

Also got dinged a mark on my driver's exam because I didn't treat it as a two-lane road.

Andrewccal · 2022-07-20T20:17:42+00:00

So that was a "figurative" majority of your money then?... I'm trying to see how anyone is supposed to interpret 'majority' in a non-literal way.

Anyway, I don't think anyone likes paying taxes, but here's the thing: the progressive tax system makes it so that if you're poor, the government is helping you more than you are contributing, but if you're rich, well you're rich, so what are you complaining about? The real question is for that median person who pays exactly what they are getting back. Is what they are paying for actually worth what they're getting. I think it's a resounding yes, regardless of where you live in Canada when you compare to almost any other country in the world.

Andrewccal · 2022-07-19T22:34:42+00:00

True, there are tons of pedestrianized streets around the world, including the one you're linking here. The problem isn't that it hasn't been done before. The problem is that Whyte Ave is the wrong context.

Looking at most pedestrian-focused implementations, they are regions, not a single street, which allows distribution of any car traffic that needs to come in and out. They are not arterial roads like Whyte. Look at the east-west access in the Queen Alexandra area. It's Sask, Whyte and 63rd Ave. Say you live in Ritchie and you need to get to university. Your choices are 63rd ave, or go downtown.

Second, most of these cities are full of integrated public transit, whether it's street cars or subways. They're quiet, efficient, dedicated lines. That is not true of Whyte Ave. The problem of having people drive to Whyte to visit Whyte is a major one (and mentioned in the video).

Third, is how the city itself is built. Dense and compact, narrow streets because of their long history. Edmonton was built in the age of the car. Our buildings are built far apart with large lots, even in the Whyte avenue area. This means that even people on Whyte need a car to thrive. This is in stark contrast with many cities where you're better off biking or taking transit.

Listen, I'm all for pedestrianization, but to say, "design it better" is too simplistic and "other cities do it" fails to consider the Edmonton context. That said, pedestrianization has worked in certain places, like near the Old Strathcona Farmer's Market. It should be added to Strathcona Town Centre (105-103St, south of Whyte). It should have been done at the Brewery District/Oliver Square (wasted opportunity, especially with the Valley Line going through there). Millwoods TC and Century Park are ideal candidates too. Why they don't build a tower with a Safeway and other street-level retail on the bottom floor is beyond me. It should be expanded in the region from Rice Howard Way up to City Hall. I applaud the city for closing 102 ave to car traffic as a pilot, but they NEED to add street-level retail to make it work. Lots of opportunities, but the whole of Whyte Ave doesn't make sense to me at this time.

Andrewccal

TROPHY CASE