We recently secured and cleaned up the Courtenay Station, we worked with a local student to do the work needed to secure the station.
Once the window coverings were in place William Munro shared his experience with us.
Thank you for opportunity to work for the Island Corridor Foundation to cleanup and secure the Courtenay Railway Station. It was a great experience for me and I believe you will be very happy with our results. I have attached some pictures of the work we have completed.
I have a very interesting story that I would love to share with you about my experience working at the train station. My father and I spent the first week in June securing the perimeter of the building. We covered every door and window with plywood except for the main entrance that has a metal grate door.
The second week we went back to the train station to clean the inside of the building. When we went in I noticed that the stairs to the attic in the loading bay had been lowered to the ground. I thought it was very interesting that the stairs were down and the previous week they were raised to the ceiling. I assumed that someone with a key had been in the building as the outside perimeter was secure.
I thought I would go up the stairs into the attic to see what was up there. I climbed the stairs to the roofline and slowly opened the big attic hatch door. The place was in complete darkness and I could not see anything in the blackness. I got my IPhone and turned on the flashlight and scanned the room. Crouched over in the corner was a homeless man… all I could see were the whites of his eyes staring back at me. It absolutely freaked me out and I ran down the stairs. We yelled at the man to come down and called the police. The poor homeless man came down from the attic with a broken backpack and a sleeping bag. He was absolutely filthy and covered in black dirt.
We asked him how he got into the building and he took us outside and pointed at a small access panel. He then pulled out a bolt and a hasp and gave it to my father. The homeless man had worked the bolt out and opened this panel. The panel was used as a coal chute in the early days to get the coal to the basement for the coal fired burner. The man had been climbing up and down the coal chute to get access to the building. We felt very sorry for the man as he slowly walked down the railway tracks. This is one crazy story that I will never forget. We secured the hatch so that it cannot be accessed again.
Our Destination Imagination Team managed to raise enough money for us to attend the Global Destination Imagination competition in Knoxville Tennessee. Our 22 gram balsa wood structure held the second highest amount of weight of 985 lbs. The first place winner of the competition held 1010 lbs.
Out of 67 teams that entered the structural design competition, our team came in first in Canada, third in North America, and fifth in the world. It was an absolutely amazing experience for our team.
I wanted to personally thank you for giving me this contract to clean up and secure the Courtenay Railway Station. The funds that I have raised helped to cover some of the expenses for my trip to the Destination Imagination Global Competition. The remaining money will go to my next adventure of travelling to Germany on a student exchange program in 2018.
Please keep me in mind if you have any further jobs or projects where you might require some help. I am always looking for opportunities in life and any help is always appreciated. Thanks.
Sincerely,
William Munro
