Here's A Time-Lapse Video From Peterborough Square To Cobourg

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Footage From Mike Judson Of The Nasty Storm That Blew Into Peterborough Tonight

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Here's The Top 10 Intersections For Collisions In Peterborough

Peterborough Community Police's Traffic Managment Unit has released stats so far this year for the Top 10 intersections for collisions (and what the Top 10 were last year).

"The one intersection of note," according to the police release, "is that Monaghan and Lansdowne is no longer in the Top 10 for this year. It actually did not make the Top 20. It has been #1 or #2 for the past 5 years."

Here's the breakdown...

2012 So Far

1 Clonsilla and the Parkway

2 Clonsilla and Sherbrooke

3 Parkway and Lansdowne

4 Rubidge and King

5 Fairbairn and Parkhill

6 Parkhill and George

7 Lock and Lansdowne

8 Sherbrooke Rubidge

9 Ashburnham and Lansdowne

10 Clonsilla and Goodfellow

 

2011 Year End Stats

1 Sherbrooke and Clonsilla

2 Monaghan and Lansdowne

3 Monaghan and Parkhill

4 Clonsilla and Goodfellow

5 Parkway and Lansdowne

6 Clonsilla and Parkway

7 Bellevue and Chemong

8 Wolsely and Chemong

9 Parkhill and Fairbairn

10 Sherbrooke and Monaghan

 

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How To Land A Summer Job In Peterborough

Fleming student Victoria Forbes teaches dance lessons and runs a photography business to make summer earningsFor the hundreds of students who call Peterborough home, the daunting task of searching for a summer job often feels like an uphill battle. However, students losing hope shouldn’t give up because when armed with a little bit of creativity, knowledge of local resources, and a lot of effort, it becomes possible to win this battle and successfully gain a job.

What’s impressive about Peterborough is the large number of resources that exist to help students living in the city. Websites such as Employment Planning and Counselling and Peterborough Careers list a broad range of positions, many of which are temporary student jobs.

Yet with so many students living in the city, sometimes it takes more than just this knowledge to land an interview. Over the course of my own job search, I discovered that social media is a great tool for connecting locally and receiving leads on jobs. I sent out over ten tweets in which I tagged locals who specialize in the area I was looking for work (Communications), and I couldn’t be happier with the number of responses I received. No one had jobs available with their organizations, but many tweeters went out of their way to direct me to others companies and job postings that I may find helpful. Social media also helped me learn that tourism is extremely important to Peterborough and therefore businesses that benefit from tourism are extremely likely to hire seasonal help.

Another way I’ve learned to make local connections is through volunteer opportunities. I think many students (myself included!) expect to see job postings that are an exact match to their interests, skills, and education—oh how rare that is! While some people aren’t picky about summer opportunities, those that are hoping to eventually find work in their field should highly consider volunteering for organizations that interest them.

The beautiful thing about smaller cities like Peterborough is they have a great community feel, and local professionals are often more than happy to help a keen student looking for opportunities to grow. I’ve had many friends tell me that they’ve called and emailed people they would like to work for, and that as long as you demonstrate you’re passionate and carry yourself with courtesy and respect, you can gain some great advice and unpaid experience from these organizations.

Of course the ultimate goal is to gain employment with the organization, and maybe that will come the following summer, upon graduation, or maybe never. But the references, networking skills, and experience that can be gained through volunteering are greatly rewarding.

Occasionally, individuals try all the above strategies and are still stuck. It’s at this point that some students take matters into their own hands and use their education and passions to create their own job. This is what I’ve done for the past three summers. Having received a certificate in music from Humber College, I realized I’d be hard-pressed to find a summer job relative to my field in Peterborough, so I started teaching saxophone and piano lessons. While this has only been a side job for me, I’ve spoken to several other students over the years who rely on their entrepreneurial skills to make all of their summer earnings. Examples range from photography businesses to dance and music lessons.

The key takeaway is that living in a smaller city is not always a bad thing when it comes to the summer job hunt. Being able to get your name out relatively easily and talk to a variety of resources on a regular basis is a unique opportunity that Peterborough students should be proud to say they have.

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Beth McClelland is a public relations student and music certificate graduate of Humber College in Toronto. She grew up in Peterborough and enjoys spending summers here with her family. Beth is passionate about innovations in social media, music performance and marketing, and community service opportunities.

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Sightings: The Bears Aren't Coming To Us, We're Going To The Bears

[CHEX Newswatch]

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A Person By The Name Of Elton John Is Playing Peterborough September 8th

Kruz FM and The Wolf report this morning that Elton John is coming to Peterborough on Saturday, September 8th at 8 p.m. Tickets go on sale on Friday, May 25th at 10 a.m. for the concert, which takes place at the Memorial Centre. Tickets will be available at MemorialCentre.ca, the box office or by calling 705.743.3561. We have a feeling these tickets might go quickly.

You might have heard a few of his songs...

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A Primer On The History Of Economics In Peterborough (And What's Driving It Now)

At this time of year, we often reflect on where we've been and look to where we may go. In economic terms where we have been is a lot clearer than where we might go.  However, taking a longer term view there are some hints about where we could go, if we chose to go there.

Peterborough, in general terms, has seen two quite different economic eras—an era when natural resources and agriculture dominated—the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, and a manufacturing era that was at its peak in the middle of the last century. Between these two eras was a period of transformation. In this period new ways of doing business began to emerge, new roles for government became clearer, even the roles within families and families themselves changed to take advantage of the new opportunities of the manufacturing era.

For the sake of perspective, if we were to think of the age of transformation being five years before the beginning of WWI (1909) and five years after the end of WWII (1950), we can see an era of enormous development technologically that was accompanied by unprecedented changes in social roles. In the forty-one years from 1909 to 1950, Peterborough was transformed. In that transformation, the fundamental functioning of the Peterborough economy changed. In effect, the two eras are two very different economies with very different economic relationships.

As much as many mainstream economists—the ones who led us into the current economic mess—would like us to believe that the fundamentals of economies are not subject to history, politics, or culture, the reality is they are. Separating fact from myth reveals very different economic characteristics in different technological and socioeconomic eras—not common underlying behaviours. What can we learn from this?

It has been forty-one years since what could be considered the beginning of the end of the era dominated by manufacturing. 1971 was just prior to the OPEC oil crisis that signalled the beginning of a long struggle with inflation that was combined with high rates of unemployment, and difficult economic times. Peterborough was not immune to this economic disease, and for those who went through it, it was clear that things would never be the way they were no matter how much we wished they could be. Like it or not, another era of transformation began in the early 1970s and we continue to find ourselves in it today.

In the tranformation, old ways of doing many things were left behind—technologically and socially—and new, creative opportunities were pursued. Change was embraced rather than seen as a threat. Of course, in an era of transformation that included two World Wars separated by the Great Depression is a very different circumstance than we face today. 

The lesson from history—not from economics—is that the foundations of economic growth in the past are not sufficient to support the prosperity we are capable of in the future. The longer it takes for us to figure out how to build the new foundation, the more difficult the transition will be. It is time to get on with creative change in the way we do things right here in Peterborough.

Thankfully, we have within the community what it takes to move forward. To support the transition, we have a large creative class that will provide news ways to get things done. This class according to Richard Florida’s work, and a recent description of it by Dan Taylor, CEO of the Greater Peterborough Area Economic Development Corporation and the Greater Peterborough Innovation Cluster, show that not only does the creative class drive innovation, it is also an economic driver onto itself. 

Thirty percent of the population belongs to the creative class. Those in the creative class earn significantly more than average and possess seventy percent of total disposable income. In a time of transformation the creative class is where the jobs are, and the results of their work will bring more jobs across the whole community.

All indications are that we have all the pieces in place that can lead to a new era of prosperity here in Peterborough. We have a creative class that can lead innovation. We have the resources—people, money, and technologies—necessary to move forward. The question is: Do we have the will to embrace new ways of doing business, new roles for government, new approaches to education, etc., so that we can use the resources we have at hand to their best advantage? How can we combine and integrate what we do have in creative, productive ways.

Rest assured that if we cling to the ways of an older era, communities less well blessed with resources will embrace new, productive ways. Their success will make ours that much longer and more difficult to achieve. This could be the time for us to take the leap—including a leap of faith—into a new era of creativity, opportunity, and prosperity.

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Contributed by PtboCanada's Tom Phillips Ph. D. Phillips is Economist & Sustainability Director - Greater Ptbo Innovation Cluster.

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What Peterborough Needs To Do To Solve The Productivity Puzzle

With Canada suffering less than most industrial nations from the global economic malaise, we tend to think that we are ahead in the economic "game".  In fact, for more than a decade we have lagged behind in productivity—e.g. production of goods and services per worker—than most industrial nations. 

Each year, the gap between us and other more productive nations gets bigger. We talk—more like whisper—about this, but we rarely do anything concrete about it. We wait for something to happen that will turn us around. Maybe a decade of waiting is long enough. It is time to act.

In 2012, let's stop waiting for big government, bigger corporations, the rest of the world, or the "universe" to do it for us and do what it takes, right here in Peterborough, to become more productive.

Think of it this way. We, in Peterborough, have received a Christmas present—a new jigsaw puzzle. In its sturdy box, the puzzle contains all the pieces we need to solve the productivity puzzle. We've unwrapped the puzzle, looked at the picture on the front of the box, but we have not yet opened the box. Between Christmas and New Years, we've talked to family and friends about the picture on the box (no one seems to know exactly what it is—kind of abstract, it seems), so we still haven’t opened it. 

According to the instructions, there are pieces that represent aspects of the work being done at Fleming College, Trent University, PRHC, OMNR, GE, Siemens, SGS Lakefield Research, Rolls Royce, QTG Pepsico-Frito Lay, Operitel, McColl Turner, LLF, Merit Precision, Steel Works, Page Design, the City and County of Peterborough, a vibrant and creative downtown, talented and ambitious people, and enough technology to sustain much larger communities than Peterborough. 

Still, we’re talking more about putting the pieces together than actually trying to do it. We are not alone in this. Many communities are in the same situation. The competitive reality is that the community that puts the puzzle together first will reap the greatest economic benefit.

When we finally open the box and spread the pieces on the table, there is one thing we can be sure of: The puzzle will not be put together by the invisible hand of the market. It will only come together from our will to act, and the action itself.

We, in Peterborough, have all the pieces—resources—we need but we need to complete it, but we need a new way to put this difficult puzzle together. Old ways of putting puzzles together simply will not work. We need to creatively and collectively find new ways to solve the puzzle; news ways to benefit from the resources available for us to use.

And we need to do it right here in Peterborough.    

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[Contributed by PtboCanada's Tom Phillips Ph. D. Phillips is Economist & Sustainability Director - Greater Ptbo Innovation Cluster.]

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The Amount Of Money Our Community Donates to Charity Is Well Above National Average

[chextvDOTcom]

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