Mining goes metropolitan

It is a rare sight — a 2-boom jumbo, longhole drills, and a tube-shaped electromagnetic device brightly clad in yellow sitting there at street level in downtown Toronto, dwarfed by a 50-storey office tower. The mining machinery seemed orphan-like, as if they had been abandoned on a front stoop. The heart of Toronto’s financial district is not the customary venue for underground machinery. But it did attract curious onlookers, and that was the point of the exercise, the brainchild of the sometimes overly inconspicuous Ontario Mining Association. Mining, by and large, occurs in the hinterland, out of the public eye. In spite of the fact that no one can go through even a single day without using metal in some form or another — cutting vegetables with a stainless steel knife, driving about in a zinc-coated car — the mining industry is not visible enough in Canadian public affairs. In this environmentally-conscious age, when public opinion and public policy are still evolving over the eventual reality of such things as the concept of “sustainable development,” mining’s contribution to society must be broadcast.

So the Ontario Mining Association held its public ceremony in the Toronto financial core to kick off Mining Week. Apart from the eye-catching sight of mining machinery, the event featured speeches by OMA President Andrew Rickaby and Toronto Mayor Art Eggleton. Tucked into a corner of the office tower lobby was a display by Inco Ltd. and a Chevrolet Lumina stripped to expose all the zinc metal parts that make the car go. Mingling with the lunchtime crowd — it wasn’t a huge turnout — were OMA members sporting white T-shirts with the red and grey Ontario Mining Week logo. The Lady Godiva Memorial Band, a colorful, noisy group of University of Toronto engineering students, enlivened the ceremonies.

Our hats go off to the OMA for staging the spectacle. It follows other such endeavors put on by the likes of the uranium mining industry in Saskatchewan and the very effective Zincmobile promotion. Through such initiatives, the message will get through to the general public. Next year, however, the OMA should launch Mining Week with one of those monster trucks, say a 100-ton Caterpillar or Dresser off-highway hauler, rolling down Yonge Street.