[URBAN NOTE] Ten Montréal links

• The Map Room Blog links to some old maps of Montréal.
• Major English-language newspapers in Montréal, including the Montreal Gazette, are no longer being distributed to Québec City clients. CBC reports.
• Radio-Canada employees’ union is concerned over cost overruns in the construction of a new headquarters for the French-language chain. CTV NEws reports.
• La Presse notes how the to-be-demolished Champlain Bridge is a home for, among others, falcons.
• The Bibliothèque Saint-Sulpice, after the latest delay, will have been closed for nearly two decades. La Presse reports.
• The Montreal Children’s Library is celebrating its 90th anniversary with a fundraiser. CBC reports.
• CBC Montreal looks at how, even without a stadium, legendary mayor Jean Drapeau brought major league baseball to his city.
• The anti-gentrification University of the Streets group has some interesting ideas. CBC reports.
• The city government of Montréal is looking into the issue of the high retail vacancy rates in parts of the city. CBC reports.
• At CBC Montreal, Ontario-born Jessica Brown writes about her struggles with employment in her adopted city.

[URBAN NOTE] Five Montréal links

• Renovating the Oratoire St. Joseph will surely be costly. CTV News reports.
• CBC Montreal looks back to when the Montreal Expos seemed like they might not be bought.
• Le Devoir notes how, in Québec, the Liberals are concentrated on the islands of Montreal and in Laval, in their fortress.
• An old Montreal metro car has been repurposed as a hangout for Polytechnique students. CBC reports
• CBC Montreal reports on the proposal of Matt McLauchlin to name a plaza at Frontenac metro station after murdered activist Joe Rose. I like the idea.

[URBAN NOTE] Nine Montréal links

• The 9th floor restaurant at the Montréal Eaton’s looks like an architectural delight. CBC reports.
• This bike repair shop in Greenfield Park looks cool. CBC repors.
• I quite like the idea behind this rooftop garden in Saint-Henri. CBC reports.
• Is building a baseball stadium for Montréal after the Expos went going to be as much of an issue, and in the same ways, as building a hockey stadium after the Nordiques was for Québec City? CTV News reports.
• Renovictions are almost always a bad thing. CTV News reports.
• A cooperative of artisans has banded together to operate a storefront location in Saint-Denis that none could afford individually. CTV News reports.
• Amherst Street has been renamed Atateken, as part of reconciliation with indigenous peoples. CBC reports.
• The plight of homeless indigenous people around Cabot Square is desperate. CBC reports.
• La Presse notes a sharp fall in attendance at the Grande Bibliothèque over the past decade, a consequence of cutbacks.

[PHOTO] Nine photos from in and around Kew Gardens, The Beaches

As part of a campaign by the Beach Village BIA to attract pedestrian traffic to The Beaches, outdoor screenings of different movies have been scheduled every Wednesday night in Kew Gardens. I’ve gone to the past two, certainly appreciating the chance to explore.

[URBAN NOTE] Five city links: Kingston, Montréal, Wichita, Vancouver, New York City

• After years of renovations, the Kingston Frontenac Public Library is set to reopen to the public this weekend. Global News reports.
• McGill is taking care of the tens of thousands of ants in a colony displaced from the Insectarium in Montréal during renovations there. CBC reports.
• Russell Arben Fox writes about the politics and economics of funding a new baseball stadium in the Kansas city of Wichita.
• Where will the 4/20 marijuana celebration be held in Vancouver in 2020? Global News reports.
• This article at Slate explains how lower Manhattan can only be protected from rising sea levels by land reclamation.

[URBAN NOTE] Five city links: Hamilton, Waterloo Region, Prince Edward County, Montréal, Sherbrooke

• CBC Hamilton profiles an interesting local project, recycling the reclaimed wood from a late 19th century building at 99 James Street North into guitars.
• CBC Kitchener-Waterloo notes that municipal politicians in that conurbation do not want their cities merged into a single unitary Region of Waterloo megacity.
• The popular destination of Prince Edward County, a destination for many from Toronto, is starting to face a shortage of affordable housing. Global News reports.
• CBC Montreal notes a proposal to build a baseball stadium in the underused lands of the Peel Basin. Might the Expos yet return?
• La Presse notes that the bill for Sherbrooke hosting the 2021 Jeux de la Francophonie is estimated to be $C 84 million.

[URBAN NOTE] Five city links: Mississauga, Montréal, New York City, Winnipeg, Tijuana

• After consultation with indigenous groups, Mississauga is removing all Indigenous symbols from sports teams and facilities. blogTO reports.
• This Huffington Post Québec article, in French, notes that Montréal can make a very good case for again supporting a major league baseball team. The Expos may return.
• VICE notes that the idea of legalizing marijuana sales in New York State, and of devoting the funds raised from marijuana taxation to rebuilding the New York City subway station, is becoming popular.
• The latest redrawing of provincial electoral boundaries in Manitoba leaves the growing metropolis of Winnipeg with one seat more and rural Manitoba with one seat less. Global News reports.
• Laura Agustín reports on the experiences of a volunteer lawyer working with the Central American migrant caravan in Tijuana, here.

[URBAN NOTE] Five city links: Hamilton, Iqaluit, San Francisco, Sydnbey, Sihanoukville

• That the real estate market in Hamilton, Toronto’s traditionally more affordable western neighbor, is so strong that some people have been pushed into homelessness is a concern. The Toronto Star reports.
• Iqaluit is acting to deal with the threatened water shortages, but will it succeed in time to hold off this concern? MacLean’s reports.
• This Bloomberg View article suggesting the unaffordability of San Francisco came not so much as a result of the tech sector as because of Barry Bonds’ sports success is interesting. Thoughts?
• The extended fire season of Sydney, Australia, will force Sydneysiders to adapt to this dangerous new environment. Guardian Cities reports.
• The SCMP looks at how an influx of Chinese investment is transforming Sihanoukville, the leading deep-sea port of Cambodia.

[URBAN NOTE] Five city links: Port Hope, Montréal, Shediac, Halifax, Vancouver

• Finally, the remediation of the low-level radioactive waste scattered around Port Hope is starting. Global News reports.
• Will Montréal bring back the Expos? Global News gauges opinion.
• I congratulate Shediac for winning the world record for the longest lobster roll. Global News reports.
• The new Glitter Bean Café in Halifax sounds like a fun queer-oriented coffee shop. Global News reports.
• Terry Glavin argues that the city government of Vancouver is being terribly negligent in allowing the city to be undermined by unregulated income flows. MacLean’s has it.

[NEWS] Five sci-fi links: HAL 9000, Space Seed on VHS, baseball on DS9, Civilization, AIs doing D&D

• How did the movie version of HAL 9000, from 2001, come about? And why does HAL sound so Canadian? The National Post reports.
• The official Star Trek website explains how the release of the episode “Space Seed” on VHS helped change the videocassette market of the 1980s, here.
• Deadspin explains how the central role played by the sport of baseball in Deep Space 9 underlined the ways in which that show was atypical Trek.
• Rock Paper Shotgun examines how many long-run civilization-building games, like Civilization, do a poor job of depicting stagnation and decline, and what this failure says about us now.
• The idea that the game that artificial intelligences need to learn to play is not chess but D&D–that games involving roleplaying are good tests for general intelligence–seems obvious to me. Aeon has it.