That horrible screetching you hear at Queen and Parliament? Get used to it.

The other day, Jenna and I awoke to the sound of screaming steel at Queen and Parliament as TTC streetcars diverted south. Streetcar after streetcar made the turn, and I thought, “I wonder what’s wrong. I wonder how long long they’ll divert traffic.”

Turns out we’re in for more than a month of this. From TTC.ca:

Route diverting during watermain replacement

Starting 6:00 am, Monday, July 20 until 7:00 am, Tuesday, September 8, The City of Toronto and the TTC will conduct watermain replacement and streetcar track reconstruction affecting Queen Street East, between Berti Street and Jarvis Street. During construction, route 501 QUEEN and 502 DOWNTOWNER streetcars and 301 QUEEN route all-night streetcars will divert eastbound via Victoria, Adelaide, Church, King and Parliament. Westbound streetcars will divert via Parliament, King , Church Richmond and Victoria.

The stops on Queen Street East, between Victoria Street and Parliament Street will not be served.

Want to know what it sounds like? I made a quick and dirty recording. Make sure you listen all the way through before reading on:

Audio clip: Adobe Flash Player (version 9 or above) is required to play this audio clip. Download the latest version here. You also need to have JavaScript enabled in your browser.

One more thing: the 501 passes by our corner often. From 6am to 11pm, it comes by about every ten minutes. In both directions, east and west. So if we’re lucky, we hear this once every five minutes.

How long before I go crazy, I wonder.

[mp3 download]

[original image by mattjiggins]

Ordering a “Northbound Southbound” vinyl sticker from Walloper.com

In late December, Jenna and I finally received our Northbound Southbound vinyl wall decal from walloper.com. It’s awesome. We love it.

But though the decal itself is terrific, and looks great in our apartment, the shipping and customer service from Walloper was abysmal. We ordered the decal on November 20, and it didn’t arrive until more than a month later, on December 23rd. In the meantime, Jenna sent several emails, the first of which was ignored or lost (Derek at Walloper cited a “spot of trouble with our email provider”), and they misquoted delivery timelines twice. I understand that walloper is a small company with an overnight success on their hands, and I realize that it’s run by a small handful of people. But still, I can’t help but feel like they could have handled us a little better.

Still… the product is pretty cool: