There are few better things a person can do for themselves than go for a walk. It’s great for the mind, body, and spirit, and it costs nothing.

In 2022 I started getting my 10,000 steps, which has been wonderful on different levels, but a funny thing happens when you use your phone to track your walking: the app has a way of penetrating into your mind, and soon you count the steps, not your phone. I half-joke that I don’t walk for the sake of my health, but to see the bar in the app turn green and all those balloons and confetti.  

I know in my bones what 10,000 steps feels like. It’s about 94 minutes and just over 8 kilometres. I can tell at any point during my walking, with pretty uncanny accuracy, how many steps I’ve taken and how many there are still to go. I can look at a distance and know how many metres it is, and from there calculate how many steps it’ll take to walk.

This has taken some of the joy and whimsy out of my walking. At first, the whole point was to leave my home and go somewhere I’d never been. I’d find new laneways and quiet side-streets I’d otherwise never go. It was great! There was a sense of discovery. I didn’t have earbuds then and didn’t need music; I’d think my thoughts and being out in the world was stimulating enough.

Now I often listen to music but still, my mind’s step-calculator churns. “Drain walks” have become a new way to get some purpose from the steps.

A drain walk is a simple thing: you walk around your neighbourhood, and if you see a build-up of leaves blocking a sewer grate, you kick them away or down the drain. Then, when it rains, the water will drain properly into the sewer instead of build-up on the road where it can potentially flood basements, ruin somebody’s car battery, or just cause problems.

A drain walk is a great thing to do before it rains or during it. Walking 10,000 steps a day sometimes means walking in bad weather, and having motivation when the weather is ugly is welcome.

Personally, I get satisfaction on some OCD level from nudging a little blockage away so a tiny obstruction doesn’t prevent an entire system from working properly. The streets should have a good flow. Does this tiny civic mitzvah change the world? Nope. But it can only be a good thing. If this helps the city at all on some microscopic level, I like doing that and enjoy that it’s quiet. No spotlight.

I’d drain walk even if I was assured it provided zero help to anybody. I just find it satisfying. But on one early drain walk, a woman opened her second storey window to tell me, “clearing the grates is so important!” I felt seen which was nice but more than anything, it was so funny. I still laugh about it.

A couple days ago, the City of Toronto’s Twitter account posted this:

OK, City of Toronto admin. I was built for this!

When you’re on a drain walk, focus on the bottoms of hills, where the water pools. That said, you also want to clear the drains at the mid way point of the slope and at the top, so less water pools at the bottom. Without getting too much into the concept of psychogeography, having a little higher purpose to walk around your neighbourhood and connect with its topography will change how you move through and see it. You’ll appreciate a good drain placement and the hills and flats will jump out at you, as cyclists experience. At the very least, you’ll think about something other than your phone app’s step counter.

YouTube

I’m not the first person to do this, in fact, drain clearing comprises an entire YouTube genre.

The best drain clearing video I’ve ever seen is by a gentleman in the US, Maine, whose online handle is Post 10. His actions in this video, which at the time of writing has over 32 million views, were way more hardcore than anything I do. That man is out there with gear and a rake! His street flood was so bad cars were driving on the sidewalk! Madness. Early in the video he says, hilariously, “this is just like last year!” He’s a local just helping out, trying to be useful.

I find his earnestness so charming. “Some people just do not care” he says as cars drive by, splashing obliviously, comfortably sealed away from the problems car infrastructure cause (roads are what cause the flooding because they’re not porous) and the problems they cause the hero valiantly trying to fixing them.

I’m not sure if Post 10 started this genre, but others unclog drains on YouTube now and he’s a celeb in this world. The comment sections are filled with people marveling at the size of the whirlpools being sucked down the grate as flooded roads are restored and made safe again. People are shocked they watched these videos to the end, mesmerized.

For me, walking around looking for clogged drains is a way to be in the moment and escape the hold my phone has on my subconscious. There’s no bad reason to go for a walk, and while you’re out there, you may as well unclog a drain! You never know. Maybe you’ll do someone a solid and prevent a flood neither of you ever find out about because it never happens.