[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] Five city links: Sainte-Marie, Saint John, Phoenix, Paris, Singapore

• The flood-damaged community of Sainte-Marie, in the Beauce south of Québec City, may not recover from necessary demolitions of damaged and dangerous structures. CBC reports.
• Erecting a barrier at an apparently suicide-attracting bridge like the Reversing Falls Bridge in Saint John makes perfect sense to me. Global News has it.
• Lawyers, Guns and Money notes that, happily, voters in Phoenix have voted again in support of a light rail mass transit project.
• Tyler Cowen at Marginal Revolution notes that the department of Paris has continued to lose population, contrary to the experience of growth elsewhere in other similar world cities.
• CityLab makes the case for Changi Airport, in Singapore, as a world-class attraction in its own right.

[URBAN NOTE] Seven cities links: Montréal;, Québec City, Saint John, Moncton, D.C., Dallas, …

• CBC Montreal reports on how a downsizing Montréal-area convent recently put on a very large yard sale.
• Will the staged construction of a tramway in Québec City lead to the partial completion of that project? CBC examines the issue.
• The New Brunswick city of Saint John recently celebrated its Loyalist heritage. Global News reports.
• The new community garden in Moncton sounds lovely. Global News reports.
• CityLab notes the sad precedent of the privatization of an old Carnegie Library in Washington D.C. into an Apple Store.
• CityLab considers if cycling can make inroads in pro-car Dallas.
• Open Democracy examines the controversy surrounding the contested construction of an Orthodox church in Yekaterinburg.

[URBAN NOTE] Five city links: Saint John, Seattle, Hong Kong, Singapore, Angkor

• A community organization in Saint John, New Brunswick, is hoping to try to save some of the many abandoned buildings in that city. Global News reports.
• Wired notes that a proposed Amazon expansion in Seattle has also been abandoned.
• Bloomberg View suggests Hong Kong is being unduly conservative in not investing its budget surpluses.
• Roads and Kingdoms tells the history of Singapore through ten local dishes.
• Ars Technica suggests the medieval city of Angkor, in Cambodia, died slowly as its complex machineries gradually ground to a halt.

[URBAN NOTE] Six city links: Oshawa, Saint John, Manhattan, Surat, Tokyo, Austin

• After GM’s closure in Oshawa, the National Observer wonders if Oshawa can pivot over to perhaps take advantage of opportunities in the green economy.
• Will Saint John, New Brunswick, be able to break out of its long decline and find a new raison d’être? Global News reports.
• Guardian Cities takes a look at the new super-tall luxury towers, homes to the rich, dotting–disfiguring?–the Manhattan skyline.
• Guardian Cities looks at how the Indian city of Surat, endangered by flooding from sea and river, is trying to adapt to its environment.
• Even as the overall population of Japan continues to decline, the population of Tokyo continues to grow through net migration, Mainichi reports.
• The Texas capital of Austin, CityLab reports, is trying to create new institutions and structures to help connect older and younger generations.

[URBAN NOTE] Five city links: Montréal, Saint John, Sydney, New York City, Katowice

• La Presse notes that reconstruction work planned for Montréal’s Saint-Sulpice library has been delayed by a shortage of workers, given the wider city’s construction boom.
• CBC notes how the Halifax Explosion led to the Oland family building the Moosehead Brewery in Saint John.
• The closure of Sydney-based call centre Servicom has left six hundred people unemployed just before Christmas. CBC reports.
• Gothamist warns people in New York City which bars to avoid during this weekend’s Santacon.
• Politico Europe notes how, in the Polish city of Katowice at the heart of Upper Silesia, even there coal is falling out of the mix as a major employer.

[URBAN NOTE] Five city links: Beechwood, Saint John, Moncton, Niagara Falls, Baltimore

• The Nova Scotia community of Beechwood has been recognized as being of historical significant for its African-Canadian links. Global News reports.
• This Sunday saw the final Masses delivered at three churches in Saint John, new Brunswick, closed down due to rising costs and falling attendance. CBC reports.
• The leaders of New Brunswick’s major political parties appeared in Moncton for that city’s bilingual Pride festivities. Ici Radio-Canada reports.
• An Ontario NDP MPP has been the latest to complain about the sewage being injected by Niagara Falls, NY, into the Niagara River. CBC reports.
• Guardian Cities reports on how what can only be interpreted as paranoid, even racist, hysteria against outsiders in greater Baltimore’s Anne Arundel county is driving a push to reduce service on its light rail system.

[URBAN NOTE] Five Canada city links: Saint John, Montréal, Hamilton, Calgary

• The rest of Saint John, New Brunswick, to have the provincial government authorize a study on municipal amalgamation has been turned down. Global News reports.
• Some old cars from the Montréal Métro are going on display as part of two exhibits. Global News reports.
• Montréal ranks second in a ranking of the top cities for millennials, all things considered. (Toronto is in the top 10.) Global News reports.
• A crackdown on payday loan establishments in Hamilton has been followed by a request that banks and other traditional lenders please consider their payday clients. Global News reports.
• Quite honestly, the argument made here that Calgary is destined to host the 2026 Olympics is actually convincing. Global News reports.

[URBAN NOTE] Six city links: California, Toronto, Vancouver, Saint John, LA, NYC, Philadelphia

• Wired notes a bill proposed at the state level in California to force cities to provide affordable and accessible housing through non-NIMBY zoning.
• The Toronto and Vancouver housing markets, perhaps uniquely among the markets of Canada’s major cities, are not seeing as much new supply as others. The Globe and Mail reports.
• The population of Saint John, New Brunswick, has fallen by a quarter since 1971. The city government wants to change this, somehow. Global News notes.
• VICE reports a new census of homelessness in Los Angeles, amid fears of locals that prior estimates might be undercounts.
• The mystery of what happened to Princess Pamela, a famous soul food cook whose Harlem restaurant was famous to those in the know, is explored in this thought-provoking essay.
• At Slate, Annie Risemberg explores how old connections to Liberia and ethnic restaurants helped a corner of southwestern Philadelphia become “Little Africa”, a destination of note for West African immigrants.

[URBAN NOTE] Five notes: Saint John, Vancouver, Peterborough, Halifax, Point Hope

• The mayor of Saint John, in New Brunswick, wants to attract migrants from Canada’s richer but more expensive cities. Global News reports.
• Vancouver wants to keep old businesses in its Chinatown going, so as to keep as much of the old community as active as possible. Global News reports.
• Peterborough’s low-income community now has a periodical, The River Magazine, to represent their issues. Global News reports.
• Assembly of the first Arctic patrol ship in a planned program has been completed in the Halifax Shipyard. CBC reports.
• The Alaskan community of Point Hope now finds itself, at least partly because of global warming and the interests of financiers, with all of the Internet bandwidth it could ever want. The New York Times reports.