[URBAN NOTE] Ten city links: Laval, Calgary, Vancouver, Cleveland, Machu Picchu, London, Görlitz …

• The Québec city of Laval now has a cemetery where pets can be buried alongside their owners. CBC reports.
• Talk of Alberta separatism has already cost Calgary at least one high-profile non-oil investment, it seems. Global News reports.
• A new piece of public art in Vancouver, a spinning chandelier, has proven to be a lightning rod for controversy. CBC reports.
• Guardian Cities looks at the continuing fight against lead contamination in Cleveland.
• Machu Picchu was built in a high remote corner of the Andes for good reasons, it is being argued. The National Post reports.
• Wired looks at how rivals to Uber are currently fighting for dominance in London, here.
• Guardian Cities shares a cartoon history of the birth of Nairobi, here.
• The east German city of Gorlitz offered interested people one month’s free residence. The Guardian reports.
• JSTOR Daily notes that Hong Kong was born as a city from refugee migrations.
• Is Tokyo, despite tis size and wealth, too detached from Asia to take over from Hong Kong as a regional financial centre? Bloomberg View is not encouraging.

[URBAN NOTE] Seven city links: Guelph, Innisfil, Montréal, Asbestos, Québec City, Alberta, Richmond

• Guelph will be holding an open house to see what development will replace the Dolime Quarry. Global News reports.
• The town of Innisfil has extended its Uber subsidy program for people in need of transit. Global News reports</u.
• Archeologists in Montréal have found a mass grave of Irish famine victims. CTV reports.
• The Québec town of Asbestos is changing its name so as to avoid the link, in English, with the toxic mineral. CTV reports.
• A subway, alas, would be too big for Québec City. Streetcars would work better. Le Devoir reports.
• Can a hyperloop be built to plug Edmonton together with Calgary? Global News considers.
• Richmond, British Columbia, has unveiled a cultural harmony strategy to help its diverse population get along. The National Post reports.

[URBAN NOTE] Seven Toronto links

• John Lorinc at Spacing considers the complication idea of a city charter for Toronto. Is it worth it? Does it ignore other governance issues?
• Tourism is booming in Toronto, transforming the economy of the metropolis. The Toronto Star reports.
• NOW Toronto notes how the Toronto District School Board is introducing educational courses intended to prepare students for careers in hospitality.
• Legal controversy surrounding the governance of Mount Pleasant Cemetery, and other like cemeteries in Toronto, is ongoing. The Toronto Star reports.
• In Milton, the owner of an illegal rooming house where one tenant died has been found financially liable. CBC reports.
• The Toronto Star tells the story of soldiers returning from the First World War who attacked Chinatown and its inhabitants, here.
• NOW Toronto points to an exhibition of photos created in solidarity with Hong Kong journalists.

[URBAN NOTE] Eight Toronto links

• Samantha Edwards writes at NOW Toronto about the controversy surrounding the visit of transphobe author Meghan Murphy to give a speech at the Palmerston library, with authors even threatening a boycott of the network.
• Natasha Tusikov writes at The Conversation about how Sidewalk Labs’ proposals for the Port Lands would give it great and unaccountable political power.
• blogTO looks at the 1945 proposal for a subway in Toronto, one with a west-east axis not on Bloor but further south on Queen.
• blogTO looks at Sparkles, the nightclub at the top of the CN Tower that reigned over the Toronto scene in the 1980s.
• Will the Scarborough neighbourhood of Birchcliffe-Cliffside by changed for the worse by new dense construction? The Toronto Star reports.
• People who, in illegally climbing the Scarborough Bluffs, get trapped on said feature might soon be charged with the costs of their own rescue. blogTO reports.
• The growth of popularity of specifically Toronto slang is fascinating. Global News reports.
• Jamie Bradburn shares an old article on St. John’s Norway cemetery, here.

[URBAN NOTE] Five city links: cemetery parks, alcohol, floating cities, homeless, sanctuary cities

• JSTOR Daily looks at how, in the 19th century, many cities made their cemeteries into parks.
• Guardian Cities considers which city in the world is the hardest-drinking one.
• CityLab notes that building cities is not going to be the answer to global warming.
• The Conversation looks at the demographics of the homeless of North America.
• The threat of Donald Trump to send undocumented immigrants to sanctuary cities in the United States has widely noted. Maybe this actually might be a good solution? Global News reports.

[URBAN NOTE] Five Toronto links: Crystal Papineau, office space, TTC upload, cemetaries, 1999 snow

• Laurie Monsebraaten at the Toronto Star looks at the life of Crystal Papineau, the homeless woman who died in a tragic accident in a Bloorcourt clothing donation box.
• A construction boom is ongoing in Toronto to meet the growing demand for office space. The Globe and Mail reports.
• The Ontario government is preparing to upload the subway from the City of Toronto by fall. Global News reports.
• A recent lawsuit by citizen groups has seen a dozen cemeteries in Toronto, including Mount Pleasant, formally defined as public land. CBC Toronto reports.
• The National Post shares an oral history of the great snowstorm of 1999, which saw an overwhelmed Toronto call in for help removing snow from across the country.

[URBAN NOTE] Five Toronto links: #GrowthtoWatchFor, TTC, serial killer, Stella Vanzant, Viryl vinyl

• Urban Toronto notes that it will be bringing back its Growth to Watch For series in 2019.
• The Province of Ontario has made a formal request for the TTC’s data to determine the organization’s worth, preparing for a takeover. The Globe and Mail reports.
• The trial of the Church and Wellesley serial killer is expected to start in 2020. The Globe and Mail reports.
• What happened to the body of young pioneer girl Stella Vanzant, buried in a location now somewhere in the Financial District? The Globe and Mail looks at the question.
• blogTO takes a look at Viryl Technology, a local manufacturer of vinyl pressing plant equipment, with photos, here.

[PHOTO] Five photos from the Toronto Necropolis at twilight

I would have liked to have spent more time in the Toronto Necropolis, but at this point of the year the cemetery’s gates close at 5:30. I only had enough time to dip briefly into the cemetery off of Winchester Street, take a look, and dip out. I need to spend more time there: In the light of a fall twilight, this place is gorgeous.

[URBAN NOTE] Five links on cities: cemeteries, language, NUMTOTs, neighbourhoods, Yugoslavia

• Atlas Obscura notes, unsurprisingly, that some cemeteries in the United States were used as parks. Why not? These can be lovely green spaces. Just look at Toronto’s Mount Pleasant and Prospect cemeteries.
• Meg Holden at The Conversation takes a look at the language, the grammar of thought, used to praise cities this day. Have we gone too far away from the skepticism of earlier decades?
• The Guardian Cities reports on NUMTOTs, “New Urbanist Memes for Transit-Oriented Teens”, the Facebook group oriented to young urbanist fans that is hugely popular. (I’ve joined, I admit.)
• Open Democracy carries French-Iranian sociologist Farhad Khosrokhavar article on “jihadogenous urban structures”, on neighbourhoods which can alienate young people to the point of supporting Islamist terror.
• Guardian Cities shares photos of some of the bold concrete architecture developed in Yugoslavia.

[URBAN NOTE] Five notes about cities: Arctic, floating, cemeteries, wildlife, immigrants

• Wired noted how Arctic cities were facing significant problems from melting permafrost, and how they were trying to deal with this threat.
• CityLab notes the ever-popular idea of a floating city, riding the waves.
• Atlas Obscura notes, unsurprisingly, that some cemeteries in the United States were used as parks. Why not? These can be lovely green spaces. Just look at Toronto’s Mount Pleasant and Prospect cemeteries.
• In a feature on Menno Schilthuizen’s Darwin Comes to Town, Simon Worrall at National Geographic looks at the many and varied ways wildlife can adapt to city life.
• Melissa Byrnes, at Lawyers, Guns and Money, noted how Trump’s rhetoric of ICE “liberating” American communities echoed ways in which French authorities in the Algerian war militarized immigrant neighbourhoods.