A couple of days ago I wrote a short entry about Ottawa’s anti-idling by-law that’s now being enforced. According to a story by the CBC, OC Transpo has an anti-idling policy that’s stricter than the by-law in that it requires drivers to shut off their engines if it’s warmer than -5 C out. A reporter went to a transit station on a day when it was 7 C and observed 15 buses, of which 13 sat empty with their engines running for an average of 9 minutes, which violates OC Transpo’s policy. Apparently, there are ramifications for drivers who don’t respect the policy, though OC Transpo did not specify what they were in the story. Hopefully, the media coverage will be enough to pressure OC Transpo to enforce their policy more rigourously because this is both bad for the environment and wasteful of our money.

Kudos to the 2 drivers who did respect the policy — you set a good example for the others.