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Courier's life a two-wheel jungle
Toronto Star, July 21, 1988
By Frank Jones Toronto Star
Watch out, it's portable Five-oh on a direct drive, my Twenty's Yonge
and Adelaide, and I'll be cleared at Victoria and Dundas in five
minutes. Ten-four.
Translation: It's your faithful columnist cleverly disguised as a
bicycle courier, zipping through downtown Toronto on a super-fast
delivery without a second to spare.
This city is suddenly swarming with bicycle couriers, and last week I
worked as one for half a day to find out what life is like in the
two-wheel jungle.
To give credit where it's due, my kids got me up for it. Son Bryn, who
sells bikes, customized my new mountain bike for downtown traffic,
cutting down the wide handlebars and equipping it with a
super-comfortable saddle and a carrier, and daughter Yasmin, who is a
bicycle courier, coached me.
Coached me? She threw me in at the deep end. "Undo your belt," she says
before we even leave home. And she hooks on the two-way radio. "It's
portable Five-oh (my call number) calling Six-oh," I tell Yeoman
Courier Services dispatcher Ted Dworski nervously. "Tell him your
Twenty (location)," Yasmin instructs.
And then we are off for our first pick-up at a real estate office on
Mount Pleasant Rd. Only I've forgotten my helmet and my TTC tokens (we
might lock up our bicycles and take the subway for a suburban job) and
have to go back for them. It's not a good start.
A little later I have to stop and pick up a package I've dropped and I
start wondering if the whole idea isn't a bust.
Nice smile
Yasmin is encouraging. These were nothing to some of the setbacks she's
had in the last couple of weeks. She was locked in a stairwell and
couldn't get out, and another time she was trapped in an out-of-control
elevator and had to climb out of the trapdoor in the ceiling with the
help of repairmen.
After a drop-off on Eglinton Ave., we check in again. "Okay, stand by.
Cover the north end. Might be a chance to do some girl-watching until I
have something for you," says Ted.
There's not much time for that. Soon we're enjoying a sylvan ride
through North Toronto back streets on our way to St. Clair Ave. W. But
when Yasmin sends me in to do the pickup the receptionist gives me the
nicest smile.
As we're leaving we rendezvous with Dave "Rollerskate" Hopkins, another
cyclist with Yasmin's firm. Dave winces as he shakes hands. He recently
broke his wrist on the job when the steering on his new bike failed,
and only the day before he'd cut his fingers in a pickup box and had to
have stitches.
"Watch out how you go down the Avenue Rd. hill," he warns. "The road's
pretty rough." Believe me, you listen to a guy like that.
This job takes you from the executive suites in Toronto's fanciest
office towers to, in the case of our next drop-off, a church basement
on Bloor St. W. where Greenpeace has its offices.
Then we're on our way to the Frost Building on Queen's Park Circle.
Government buildings are the worst, says Yasmin, because they're
labyrinths where you have to walk miles, and no one wants to sign for
packages.
She does the next drop-off - at a fancy office in the Cadillac Fairview
building opposite the old city hall - while I watch the bikes. I can't
figure why she's so long. Turns out the address on the envelope said
the 20th floor, the office is actually on the 30th floor which means
coming all the way down and taking a different bank of elevators. All
in the day's work.
Now we're deep into courier country. It seems every tenth person has a
two-way radio. And it's war. "The drivers don't want you on the road,
and the pedestrians shout at you if you're on the sidewalk," says
Yasmin. Even crossing with the light I'm honked at by an impatient city
Animal Protection driver. I hope he's nicer to the dogs.
Then, the kind of challenge every courier relishes: A "direct drive",
meaning an urgent delivery, from the courier company's head office on
Adelaide St.W. to Victoria and Dundas, right across downtown just as
the midday traffic seizes up. I'm so excited I say, "Four-ten" instead
of "Ten-four" acknowledging the message. Sirens wail in the distance,
drivers fume, but we zip in and out, giving cement trucks a wide berth,
slipping through impossibly small gaps, catching the lights every time.
This is fantastic, thrilling. We're the Steve Bauers of Bay St. In only
a few minutes we make our drop-off at a lawyer's office. After that I
hand over the radio and head home for lunch, saddle-sore, starving, but
unbowed. For Yasmin, there's no time for lunch. She's off to deliver an
envelope on Yonge St. "It's a great job," she says. She's right.
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