Pipe poses a tripping hazard
What’s big and round and is rooted next to a Leslie St. sidewalk? Darned if we know, but maybe someone can tell us.
Now that good weather looks like it’s here to stay, everybody wants to be outside. With so many hikers hitting the sidewalks, the chances of someone tripping over something that shouldn’t be there is much greater than in winter, when walking isn’t always the best option.
Dr. Siu Chow, psychology professor emeritus at the University of Regina, alerted us to an odd pipe on the east side of Leslie, north of Eglinton Ave.
Chow is undoubtedly a learned educator, but struggled to describe it in an email, saying it looks like a “remnant of an electricity pole or a box in the middle of the pedestrian path.”
We went there and found it in front of the Wrigley chewing gum factory, which has been there since the early ’60s but is winding down after shifting production to the U.S.
There’s a fairly large pipe that protrudes about a dozen centimetres above the asphalt next to the sidewalk and has a square rod in the middle of it that extends about one metre below the surface.
By now, we’ve seen just about everything that amounts to a sidewalk tripping hazard and can usually figure out the purpose of things that other people might miss.
But this one stumped us. It may have something to do with a small lid over a pipe about a metre away, which is flush with the surrounding sidewalk. But there is no obvious connection.
If anyone can tell by the photo what it’s for, please let us know. We could use some educating. Status: We’ve asked transportation services if it can be removed from the sidewalk, since it’s rusty and doesn’t seem to serve any discernable purpose. Or at least mark it with a pylon fastened to it, so people can see it at night.
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