I am well aware that only the wonkiest of wonks (a category in which I place myself) will be interested in this detailed time-line of the CBRM Taxi By-law or as we are now calling it, the Passenger Vehicle for Hire By-law, but I find making a timeline helpful inRead More

I was perusing the Nova Scotia tenders portal this morning, as one does, and noticed the CBRM has called for bids for the next stage of the Charlotte Street re-design. Before I focused on the actual details I got distracted imagining a sort of municipal version of Trading Spaces whereRead More

Student housing The “collective enterprise” UTILE (L’Unité de travail pour l’implantation de logement étudiant) was established in 2013 “with the objective of developing a social economy student housing model specific to Quebec inspired by best practices in non-profit student housing around the world.” In 2016, working with the the ChantierRead More

I have a sister just a year younger than me and when we were kids, while we mostly got along, we sometimes, being human beings, fought. When we did it within earshot of our father, he would immediately break into a chorus of the most annoying song ever written. ItRead More

Editor’s Note: This is Part III in a series of articles on rail safety even if it doesn’t seem like it. Here are Part I and Part II.   On 1 May 2015, Canada and the United States announced “a harmonized set of tank-car regulations” that aimed, as the FinancialRead More

Fun with Numbers I was writing today’s date moments ago and realized that my enthusiasm for the occult ran away with me on Wednesday, when I included a note at the top of the newsletter pondering the numerological significance of 22.02.2022, which I had recorded as the day’s date. TheRead More

Editor’s Note: I have discovered a Spotify playlist called “Songs About Trains” which I recommend you listen to while reading this article. Also, Part I of this series is here.   In the second part of this brief series on rail safety, we’re going to talk about rail tank cars,Read More

Editor’s Note: I could not find a “Green Hydrogen” playlist on Spotify but there is a “Songs About Wind” list that might pair well with this piece.   EverWind Fuels has secured the necessary permits from the province of Nova Scotia to begin converting the former oil storage and marineRead...

I spent so much time researching rail safety and green hydrogen this week that I have time to touch just briefly on two other issues that have piqued my interest of late. One is an observation about the newly refurbished section of Charlotte Street in Sydney, but first, I mustRead More

Art imitating life In my research for this week’s article on the East Palestine train derailment, I ran across a piece on rail safety post-Lac Mégantic (a good piece, worth reading) that begins like this: An unmanned, half-mile-long train carrying tank cars full of highly flammable petroleum products barrels outRead More