[URBAN NOTE] Seven city links: Ottawa, Longueuil, Montréal, Winnipeg, Saint John, Halifax, Lethbridge

• The Ottawa Citizen suggests a recent audit of OC Transpo should have offered warnings of the Confederation Line problems to come.
• A project office has been set up for the extension of the Yellow Line in Longueuil and elsewhere on the south shore. CTV News reports.
• La Presse looks at the concerns of some artists in Rosemont-La-Petite-Patrie that they might be forced out by gentrification.
• That the Bay Building in downtown Winnipeg has been evaluated as being of little value offers an opening to Heritage Winnipeg. Global News reports.
• The New Brunswick government is forcing suburbs of Saint John to pay for city facilities that they also used. Global News reports.
• Short-term rentals are having a negative effect on real estate markets in Halifax. Global News reports.
• Downtown Lethbridge faces struggles to attract business. Global News reports.

[URBAN NOTE] Ten Toronto links

• The vicious homophobia exhibited by TCDSB trustee Mike Del Grande is, IMHO, another reason to defund public Catholic education in Ontario. Global News reports.
• The CCLV streetcars of the TTC are set to be pulled by the end of November. Global News reports.
• The Scarborough Bluffs are set to see some worthwhile investment. blogTO reports.
• CBC notes growth in food bank usage in Toronto and Mississauga.
• Presto users are being mischarged based on GPS mistakes. CBC reports.
• Renovictions have spiked 300% over the past four years. blogTO reports.
• The cost of rent continues to grow in Toronto. blogTO reports.
• A new project hopes to make Yonge and Eglinton less congested. The Toronto Star reports.
• New regulations about Airbnb should make the real estate market easier for renters. NOW Toronto reports.
• Owing to family request, a new street in Etobicoke will not be named after former Toronto mayor Rob Ford. Global News reports.

[BLOG] Some Wednesday links

• {anthro}dendum features a post by Kimberly J. Lewis about strategies for anthropologists to write, and be human, after trauma.
• Bad Astronomer Phil Plait reports on exoplanet LHC 3844b, a world that had its atmosphere burned away by its parent star.
• Centauri Dreams looks at Neptune from the perspective of exoplanets discovered near snow lines.
• D-Brief reports on the new Dark Energy Spectroscopic Instrument, installed at Kitt Peak to help map galaxies and dark energy.
• Gizmodo
• looks at how Airbnb is dealing with party houses after a fatal mass shooting.
• The Island Review shares some drawings by Charlotte Watson, inspired by the subantarctic Auckland Islands.
• JSTOR Daily looks at the late 19th century hit novel Ramona, written by Helen Hunt Jackson to try to change American policy towards indigenous peoples.
• Language Hat looks at how, until recently, the Faroese language had taboos requiring certain words not to be used at sea.
• Lawyers, Guns and Money looks at a proposal to partially privatize American national parks.
• The LRB Blog looks at what Nigel Farage will be doing next.
• Marginal Revolution looks at a speculative theory on the origins of American individualism in agrarian diversity.
• The NYR Daily looks at an exhibition of the artwork of John Ruskin.
• Personal Reflections’ Jim Belshaw remarks on a connection between Arthur Ransome and his region of New England.
• Drew Rowsome shares an interview with folk musician Michelle Shocked.
• Starts With A Bang’s Ethan Siegel emphasizes the importance of the dark energy mystery.
• Towleroad notes a posthumous single release by George Michael.
• Daniel Little at Understanding Society celebrates the 12th anniversary of his blog, and looks back at its history.
• Window on Eurasia looks at Ingushetia after 1991.
• Arnold Zwicky looks at All Saints Day.

[URBAN NOTE] Six Toronto links

• Steve Munro looks at a recent examination by the Toronto auditor-general about the problems of Presto, here.
• blogTO notes that, on the weekend of the 22nd, the Toronto Reference Library will host another book sale.
• Spacing lets someone evicted for putting his apartment up for Airbnb tell his story.
• Global News tells the story of Charlie’s Friend Art Café in Bloordale, here.
• This Toronto Life account of the life and crimes of Alek Minassian remains authentically disturbing to me.
• The idea of a Toronto city charter, a constitution to protect the city’s prerogatives, does sound pretty good to me. CBC reports.

[BLOG] Some Thursday links

• Bad Astronomer Phil Plait tells readers how the orbit of a newly-discovered object, like one of the newly found moons of Saturn, is calculated.
• D-Brief looks at the import of observations of the young HD 163296 system, where gas has been detected flowing onto young planets. Is this where atmospheres come from?
• Gizmodo notes the recent claim by Google to have achieved a quantum computing milestone.
• JSTOR Daily looks at how, in the early 20th century, old unpaved country roads gave way to modern ones.
• The LRB Blog looks at the latest on Brexit and British politics.
• Marginal Revolution notes an article arguing Airbnb has helped undermine trust even in Himalayan villages.
• The NYR Daily looks at a landmark exhibition of the works of William Blake at the Tate Britain.
• Rocky Planet shows how the hyper-precise records of ice cores can be used to identify not just the existence but the locations of volcanic eruptions.
• Starts With A Bang’s Ethan Siegel looks at a newly-founded mysterious dark ancient massive galaxy that may have insights on the processes of the wider universe.
• Window on Eurasia looks at a UN report examining how Russia, occupying Crimea, has promoted demographic transformations.
• Arnold Zwicky tells of his experiences with OUTiL, an organization he helped form in 1991 that brought together out linguists.

[URBAN NOTE] Five Toronto links: politics, real estate, transit, rainbow tunnel

• John Lorinc at Spacing looks at how the idea of municipal autonomy for Toronto should not be seen as a final solution.
• blogTO notes the contracting number of neighbourhoods open for first-time buyers, here.
• Airbnb, blogTO notes, is definitely impacting the wider real estate network.
• King Street’s transit operations should be taken as a model for wider Toronto. Spacing has it.
• The story of the rainbow tunnel visible on the northbound DVP is a sad one worth knowing. Global News has it.

[ISL] Five #PEI links: Airbnb, Charlottetown Mall, Crapaud, Région Évangéline, seaweed pie

• CBC Prince Edward Island notes the proportionally extreme impact of Airbnb on the very tight housing market in Charlottetown.
• The Guardian notes the redevelopment of the Charlottetown Mall will see new stores and several hundred new housing units.
• Peter Rukavina reports on his successful electronic mapping of every building in the community of Crapaud.
• CBC Prince Edward Island notes that a move to amalgamate the predominantly Francophone and Acadian west-end Région Évangéline into a single municipality has halted.
• Atlas Obscura reports on the PEI dish of seaweed pie, made from Irish moss, once in the community of Miminegash and now available at the Canadian Potato Museum in O’Leary.

[URBAN NOTE] Five Montréal links: Québec, real estate, Berri, Dorchester Square, Airbnb

• La Presse writes about the lack of rapport between the government of Québec and the metropolis of Montréal, and the looks at the consequences of said.
• A new CMHC study suggests that, between rising prices for housing on the island of Montréal and improved transit off-Island, it might be cheaper for many to live on the mainland. The Montreal Gazette reports.
• Turning the abandoned Berri bus station into a distribution depot sounds like a good idea to me. CTV News reports.
• The newly renovated Dorchester Square looks lovely. Global News reports.
• The Montreal Gazette looks at new strict rules on Airbnb that will hopefully limit the impact on the rental housing sector.

[URBAN NOTE] Seven Toronto links: Galleria, Gerrard Square, real estate, Don, Scarborough, #onpoli

• CBC Toronto notes the latest stage in the documentation, by Toronto artist Shari Kasman, of the now-disappearing Galleria Mall.
• The Gerrard Square Mall, blogTO suggests, is actually doing quite nicely these days.
• Airbnb listings in Toronto, taking up 1% of the rental market of Toronto, are causing significant harm to renters despite this seemingly small percentage. CBC reports.
• John Lorinc is quite right to note at Spacing that the City of Toronto is not helping the housing crisis by selling off vacant land.
• The Don River can now be celebrated, noting its rather improved status from its mid-20th century nadir. CBC Toronto reports.
• The Scarborough RT line faced near-critical shortages of usable vehicles recently. The Toronto Star reports.
• Steve Munro takes</a. a look at the details of the law uploading new Toronto transit services to the province of Ontario.

[URBAN NOTE] Five Toronto links: anti-racist protest, AI at U of T, naloxone, TTC, Airbnb

• National Observer notes how, in Toronto, hundreds of anti-racist protesters blocked a far-right group.
• A $C 100 million donation has recently been made to the University of Toronto, to fund artificial intelligence research. CBC reports.
• Harm reduction activists want TTC operators to be trained in the usage of naloxone kits, to aid overdose victims. CBC reports.
• Transit Toronto notes its new Family of Services concept, intended to help Wheel-Trans users access wider city transit.
• Samantha Edwards writes at NOW Toronto about how Airbnb is worsening the living experiences of permanent residents in condo developments, by encouraging a more transient crowd less invested in local communities.