WEBUILD
COMPETITORS
Congratulations to our SAIT competitors —
NolanMoskaluk,2ndplaceattheCanadianNational Jeunes Chefs competition and
Taylor Desjardins, Medallion of Excellence
at WorldSkills in Kazan, Russia.sait.ca/compete
Check out SAIT’s world-class programs at Open House Oct. 18-19, 2019.WEDNESDAY,OCTOBER16,2019| THEGLOBEANDMAILO A
Barely a week into their arrival,
two of the scooters were
dumped into the wading pool at
the Alberta Legislature, prompt-
ing the closing of the pool for
water testing and leading more
than one Edmontonian to reflect
that, “this is why we can’t have
nice things.”
But Mr. Lyons says the situa-
tion escalated to an unusual ex-
tent only when large numbers of
scooters were found vandalized
in concentrated areas, all with
the same specific kind of dam-
age.
“It was more about a month
ago we started to notice a bunch
of our scooters were getting
burned, melted almost, on the
top,” Mr. Lyons said.
“And it started happening in
large clumps, and they started
happening one after the other.”
Mr. Lyons said he didn’t know
exactly how many scooters had
been vandalized this way, but
that it was “a surprising number”
- an outlier even in a world
where scooter destruction is re-
corded gleefully to hundreds of
thousands of followers on the In-
stagram account Bird Graveyard,
and “scooter rage,” as Forbes
magazine recently noted, “is a
thing now.”Mr. Lyons said the situation in
Edmonton appeared to be “very
focused vandalism.”
The scooters have previously
been introduced in more than
100 cities around the world.
Mr. Lyons says it’s not clear
whether the Edmonton attacks
were the result of “a group of
mischievous people” or simply
one rogue actor “who’s just
bored and taking their general
life frustration out on scooters.”
But he stressed that, over all, the
scooters have had a very positive
reception in Alberta, with sever-
al hundred thousand rides taken
in Edmonton so far.
“The long and the short of it is
that it’s been a success in both
cities in Alberta, and we’re super
excited about that,” Mr. Lyons
said.
In addition to the arsons, Mr.
Lyons said that Edmonton saw
slightly higher instances of theft
than Calgary, but he expects that
to decrease as people realize a
stolen scooter can’t function and
also that the scooters are
tracked. (He says people who tryto steal scooters are often sur-
prised when Bird representatives
“show up in a van hours later
politely asking for our scooter
back.”)
On social media, theories
about Edmonton’s scooter van-
dalism ranged from them being
blow-torched by “angry anti-en-
vironment” activists or “radical
ultraright terrorists,” or, alter-
nately, that the scooters were
malfunctioning and burning
themselves.
“I think because they kind of
came on the scene very quickly
and there was a lot of them, they
probably caught people’s atten-
tion and they became the shiny
new object for people’s vandal-
ism,” Mr. Lyons speculated.
“It’s just the shiny new toy.
I’m hoping by next year people
will get used to seeing scooters,
they won’t be that fascinating for
people, and those people who
have a vandalistic tendency will
just walk by and ignore them.
“I know this is an aberration,”
he added. “I know we’ll be great
next year.”E-scooters:SeveralhundredthousandrideshavebeentakeninEdmontonsofar
Theoriesexpressedon
socialmediaaboutrecent
scootervandalismin
Edmontonincludethat
thedeviceshavebeen
malfunctioningand
burningthemselves.FROMANEWS |Britain and the European Union
made headway on Tuesday in
last-ditch talks on a Brexit deal
ahead of a leaders’ summit, but
with just hours left to clinch an
agreement, it was still unclear
whether London could avoid
postponing its scheduled depar-
ture on Oct. 31.
Officials and diplomats in-
volved in negotiations over the
acrimonious divorce between
the world’s fifth-largest economy
and its biggest trading bloc said
that differences over the terms of
the split had narrowed signifi-
cantly.
However, the EU’s Brexit ne-
gotiator, Michel Barnier, made
clear at a meeting of the bloc’s
ministers in Luxembourg that if
an agreement couldn’t be
reached on Tuesday, it would be
too late to send anything for
leaders to approve at a summit
in Brussels on Thursday and Fri-
day.
That could force another ex-
tension of the date for Britain’s
split from the 27 other member
states, the third since Britons
voted in a June, 2016, referen-
dum to quit the EU.
Britain’s plan to leave the EU,
which has only ever added new
member states, has compound-
ed problems for a bloc torn by
euroskepticism, economic dis-
parities and an influx of mi-
grants.
Britain has itself been polar-
ized bitterly by Brexit and, even
though an endgame appears to
be in sight, the country is still
intractably divided between
leavers and remainers.
Technical talks in Brussels on
the terms of Britain’s exit went
into the evening on Tuesday af-
ter word emerged several hours
earlier that gaps on an agree-
ment had narrowed and the two
sides were close to agreeing on a
text.
One EU official said an agree-
ment was “close but not 100-per-
cent certain,” adding “there are
still parts that need to be nailed
down.”
Others were more cautious:
One senior EU official said it was
“way too premature” to conclude
that a deal was at hand.
Sterling surged to its highest
level against the dollar and the
euro since May on rising hopes
for a deal.
The main sticking point in
talks has been the border be-
tween EU member Ireland and
the British province of Northern
Ireland.
The question is how to pre-
vent the border becoming a
backdoor into the EU’s single
market without erecting controls
that could undermine the 1998
peace agreement that ended dec-
ades of conflict in the province.Irish Prime Minister Leo Va-
radkar told reporters in Dublin
that talks had moved in the right
direction.
“But whether we will be able
to conclude a revised withdrawal
agreement, which after all is an
international treaty, in time for
the summit on Thursday, that’s
as of now unclear,” he said, add-
ing that some hours earlier the
gap had been “quite wide, partic-
ularly on the issue of customs.”
The small Northern Irish party
supporting Britain’s minority
government said further work
was required to get a deal
through.
Prime Minister Boris Johnson
is likely to need the Democratic
Unionist Party’s (DUP) support if
he is to get it through a vote in
the British Parliament.
“We respect [the] fact negotia-
tions are ongoing therefore can-
not give a detailed commentary
but it would be fair to indicate
gaps remain and further work is
required,” the DUP said in a
statement.
If London is unable to clinch adeal, an acrimonious divorce
could follow that would hit trade
and business, roil financial mar-
kets and potentially lead to the
United Kingdom splitting.
Even if Mr. Johnson wins the
approval of Europe’s big powers
for the deal his negotiators have
proposed, he must still sell it to a
British Parliament in which he
does not command a majority.
A leading figure in the 2016
referendum who came to power
as head of the ruling Conserva-
tive Party in July, Mr. Johnson
has pledged to take the country
out of the bloc on Oct. 31 wheth-
er or not a withdrawal agree-
ment has been reached.
But Parliament has passed a
law saying Britain cannot leave
without an agreement, and Mr.
Johnson has not explained how
he can get around that.
The main obstacle has been
around customs, with London
proposing that Northern Ireland
stays in the U.K. customs area
but that EU tariffs are applied on
all goods crossing from main-
land Britain to the island.
The EU had many doubts
about that plan, saying it was too
complicated, untested and not
detailed enough.
It believes the only possible
deal to be had at the summit is a
return to a “backstop” solution –
already rejected by Britain – of
keeping Northern Ireland in the
EU customs area, a proposal to-
wards which the U.K. had
moved, media reports said.
A compromise of that order
could be derailed in the U.K. Par-
liament, where a rare Saturday
session is due to be held this
weekend.
Indeed, the DUP insisted that
the region must remain within
the United Kingdom customs
union as part of any Brexit deal
and not have to follow tariffs set
by the EU.
Deal or no deal for the sum-
mit, EU officials believe another
delay to Britain’s departure date
is still likely. Extension options
range from an extra month to
half a year or longer.REUTERSBrexitdealwithinreach,butdoubtslinger
Last-ditchtalksin
Brusselsgointothe
eveningasnegotiators
saydifferenceshave
narrowedsignificantly
GABRIELABACZYNSKA
LUXEMBOURG
PADRAICHALPINDUBLIN
BritishandEuropean
Unionflagsareseen
outsideBritain’s
ParliamentinLondonon
Sept.25.OneEUofficial
saidTuesdaythatan
agreementwas‘closebut
not100-per-centcertain,’
adding‘therearestill
partsthatneedtobe
naileddown.’
FRANKAUGSTEIN/
ASSOCIATEDPRESS