Wednesday, Sep 30, 2020

Today, readers comment on RAH doctors protesting the treatment of mental health patients, parking at a new Women’s & Childrens Hospital, getting the jobless to work on farms, and loud noise versus dining.

Commenting on the story: Angry doctors slam ‘unethical’ and ‘harmful’ RAH mental health services

Hillcrest and Glenside should never have been closed.

The govt wanted money from housing development. It’s a shame they were not educated in the consequences and the differing needs of those with mental  health concerns. 

Increased drug use in the community no doubt exacerbates the issues. Perhaps both these separate issues need separate and fully trained staff. As far as I know facilities for drug use and alcohol have been reduced.

Mental health clients being housed in the community has failed because the community has no empathy. The clients left isolated. At Hillcrest they had a “community” and purpose. Also a well trained medical and nursing staff with secure emergency needs. – Hilary Adlam.

Commenting on the story: Govt coy on new hospital costs as contamination testing begins

I find it interesting that Minister Wade believes that when asked about the fewer car parking spaces at the new site, he stated “Many people don’t have cars … this site has very good access to public transport”.

When was the last time you saw anyone take a child who was sick on a bus, train or tram to hospital? Highly unlikely. This shows how out of touch this Minister is from reality. 

Why would you not consider more parking when you are creating a brand new space? Yes it will cost more but in the long run, the benefits should outweigh the costs. – Kathy Tsoutouras

Commenting on the story: Force unemployed to pick crops to get Centrelink JobSeeker: Liberal MP

I recently looked at applying for a job as a grape picker.

The employer wanted 12 month’s experience and a knowledge of certain vigneron practices.

12 month’s experience of seasonal work? As a grape picker? And a “knowledge” of practices which they could teach in an hour?

John Alexander needs a serious re-education. So do the employers. – Ron Hughes

Commenting on the story: Side serve of noise leaves bad taste in diner mouths: study

At last! I have been unhappy with cafe/restaurant noise levels for years.

I’ve even written to restaurant reviewers asking them to include an indication of noise levels in their reviews, as we and our friends are always searching for pleasant venues in which to meet where we will actually be able to talk without shouting. They are rare!

We have even left restaurants to go and have coffee and dessert somewhere else, as we’re starting to get headaches with the noise. – Kathleen Victory

No matter what the decor looks like or how fantastic the food and reviews are, I have never understood why the need to play loud music, to the point one has to yell over the top of it for conversation.

It only adds more tension and spoils the evening before it’s begun. On top of that add the people yelling into their phones or better yet, staff standing at the end of the bar polishing cutlery as if they were getting ready to go to war with the team from Game Of Thrones.  

Twenty-five-plus years of hospitality experience, and boy has it changed. I’ll stay in, thanks, till the war is over!

Count me out for a night out. – Natasha Lokteff

Agree wholeheartedly with the comments about noise levels in restaurants and cafes

I have found noise levels appear to be increasing or maybe it’s my age or both, but a lovely atmosphere, fine food, great wine and company can soon be lost in surroundings of noise, be it music or people shouting. – Rex Way

Was the ability to hold a comfortable conversation with fellow diners factored in to the study?

My main issue with moderately loud background music is that I often can’t hear properly what my companion is saying across the table.

I’m in my 70s, but I don’t need to use a hearing aid. Conversation is a pleasurable part of dining out. – Maureen Howland

This isn’t exactly news. Most people I know have been complaining about too-noisy cafes and restaurants for more than 25 years.

And it isn’t just Adelaide – every capital city in Australia is just as bad. Having more sound-absorbent surfaces and slightly softer music would reduce the noise and increase the diners’ pleasure enormously. – Greg Ferguson

An excellent article, highlighting opinions now arising globally: chic restaurant and bar decor is in general creating noisy environments without consideration for client comfort and in many cases impeding normal relaxed conversation. Certainly far and away from providing a haven to escape over a coffee or cocktail.

However, this is but one facet of the global boom in minimalist decor that has peaked in many open plan office environments, and also in almost all new houses and flats with beautifully tiled or timbered floors and wall to wall panoramic windows lacking drapes.

Just stand in the living area and clap your hands to experience a strong echo: this is an acoustic nightmare, that ironically ¨complements¨ other modern technology. In such an environment, large flat screen TVs with tiny concealed speakers yield very poor intelligibility for speech, even when supplemented by the now almost obligatory appendage of a sound bar. How strange, that your magnificent TV as delivered is acoustically handicapped.

And as for music, with streaming on smart phones using ear buds as the dominant medium, few households now even provide for high quality music reproduction. The days of an OK loungeroom stereo are long past, as zapping on the run has largely superseded relaxed listening to entire albums of music (apart from the recent Vinyl trendies). And ironically, the few audiophiles lashing out on costly and exotic audio component systems often then handicap them in minimalist acoustic nightmares, so different from their sales demonstration environment.

In summary, minimalist restaurants, offices and living areas mostly suffer from an attractive aesthetic design by architects without concern for and in many cases with sublime ignorance of the acoustic consequences, above all for spèech intelligibility, but even less for high fidelity music reproduction. – Anthony McLaren Collins

In discussing our café culture, I am fascinated by the growing trend  of being provided with a soup spoon to eat foods other than soup, and often a dessert spoon with which to eat soup. Do waiting staff no longer know the difference? – Alison Whish

Commenting on the story: What we know today, Tuesday September 29

I support the immediate release of Julian Assange – he is a whistleblower and in my book all whistleblowers should be protected by law if they expose the truth.

Democratic countries should defend their citizens’ rights to knowing what is done in our name.

The worst thing I have ever seen on YouTube is the killing of innocent people in Iraq by an American pilot who said ’Nice’! when a car containing a father and son were attacked remotely and exterminated by a guided missile.

Surely, Assange is the least of our worries in a world that is increasingly violent and where the truth is censored and misrepresented? – Iris Iwanicki