[URBAN NOTE] Fifteen urban links

• It has been forty years since a train derailment that threatened to unleash toxic chemicals on Mississauga resulted in a remarkably successful mass evacuation. CBC reports.
• There is a Vimy display in Kingston’s Communications and Electronics Museum. Global News reports.
• It is unsettling that the Ontario city of Hamilton reports such a high levels of hate crimes. CBC reports.
• Le Devoir shares a warning that inattention to language means that Longueuil could end up becoming as English/French bilingual as the West Island.
• VICE reports on how the dying desert town of California City is hoping for a revival based on cannabis, here</u.
• MacLean’s tells the story about how an encounter of koi with local otters in Vancouver reflects a human culture clash, too.
• SCMP looks at how planners want to use big data to make Shenzhen a “smart socialist” city, here.
• CityLab hosts an article by Andrew Kenney looking at the importance of an old map of Denver for he, a newcomer to the city.
• These photos of the recent acqua alta in Venice are heartbreaking. CityLab has them.
• JSTOR Daily tells the story of an ill-timed parade in 1918 Philadelphia that helped the Spanish flu spread throughout the city.
• The LRB Blog looks at a corner of Berlin marked by the history of German Southwest Africa.
• Guardian Cities shares a remarkable ambitious plan to remake Addis Ababa into a global city.
• Durban, in South Africa, may offer lessons for other southern African metropolises. Guardian Cities reports.
• The NYR Daily recently took a look at what happened to so completely gentrify the West Village of New York City.
• Feargus O’Sullivan at CityLab takes a look at a new documentary, If New York Was Called Angouleme. What if the site of New York City was colonized by the French in the early 16th century?

[URBAN NOTE] Five city links: NYC and Montréal, Thunder Bay, Rouyn-Noranda, California City …

• Thanks to John for sharing me this review, by The Points Guy, of the apparently underwhelming Amtrak Adirondack track connecting New York City and Montréal. We deserve better.
• Sean Marshall shares, among other places at TVO, an account of the complex and roundabout grid of rail and bus routes he needed to take to get from Toronto to Thunder Bay.
• Graham Isador writes for CBC Arts about how the Québec mining town of Rouyn-Noranda became host to a major music festival.
• Wired reports on the deserted streets of California City, a metropolis proposed into existence in the mid-20th century that never took off.
• Can, as Bloomberg suggests, the property reforms that made it possible for people in Singapore to have secure homes be implemented in Hong Kong?