By now, you should have recieved your printed copy of the ECHO canyon newsletter. For your convenience, you can view an electronic version of the ECHO here: 2009 Winter ECHO. You will need a free copy of Adobe's Acrobat reader. If you would like to download this software, click on the button below.
Canyon Smog
Submitted by Randall WiseCanyon Resident
‘Tis the season to be jolly Light the fire And hang the holly…
Many of us in the canyon enjoy using our fireplaces in the winter. The glow of a fire is cheery and it warms the soul as well as the house.
But there are several ways we can enjoy this pleasure. We can load up the fireplace with wood and paper or we can use gas logs or we can have gas logs that also efficiently produce heat for the house.
While gas logs are good the best combination is a gas log fireplace with a firebox designed to produce heat for the house. These units are made in various sizes and can be inserted into an existing fireplace. The gas heats the firebox and a fan then circulates air from the room around the hot box returning warm air to the room. Because the box is sealed – typically with a glass front so we can enjoy the fire – warm air from the room is not sucked up the chimney and out of the house.
Unfortunately a wood burning fireplace is the least desirable option. While it is warm to stand in front of a fire, the warm air rising up the chimney actually sucks warm air out of the room. It also creates soot and ash and finally it creates SMOG in our beautiful canyon. Just one wood fire burning in our canyon can fill half the canyon with smoke.
So if you have a wood burning fireplace and you haven’t investigated other options now might be the time. The advantages in efficiency, safety (soot buildup in a chimney is a fire hazard), convenience and improvement to our environment are worth considering.
Email Subscriptions Now Activated
You asked and we listened. The Glenoaks Canyon Home Owners Association website now allows you to subscribe to postings. So, anytime something new is posted to the site, you will get an email notifying you of the posting and providing a link directly to the new item. If you want to be notified, enter your email address here. Or enter it on the side panel on the left.
We will continue to add new functionality to the site, so this will be a great way for you to know when there is something worth looking at.
Glenoaks Canyon Residents Evacuated
On Saturday 12/27 many residents in our canyon were evacuated from their homes from around 9:00 PM to 2:30 AM due to the discovery of the second car rented by Bruce Jeffrey Pardo (the Santa Claus Killer) parked on Glenoaks Blvd. The car was parked in the 2300 block of Glenoaks Blvd. near Tryon. For those nearby, it was a very unsettling and unexpected experience. While it turned out that there was nothing dangerous in the car, it was our diligent canyon neighbors that called police about the vehicle which had been suspiciously parked there for some time. To read more about the incident, please visit these pages at the Glendale News Press: www.glendalenewspress.com/articles/2009/01/01/news/gnp-pardo29.txt
www.glendalenewspress.com/articles/2009/01/01/publicsafety/gnp-pardo31.txt