Genesee & Wyoming (G&W) Canada Inc, owner of the Cape Breton & Central Nova Railway (CBNS), is restructuring its Nova Scotia holdings. In September, G&W Canada established a wholly-owned subsidiary called the Nova Scotia & Eastern Railway (NSERL). On October 17, G&W Canada President Rick McLellan—who also serves as presidentRead...

Editor’s Note: This is Part IV of a series that will continue until I find some answers or give up, whichever comes first. You’ll find Part I here and Part II here and Part III here.   I spent my Sunday afternoon looking at microfilm at the CBU library. IRead More

Editor’s Note: This is Part II of a series that will continue until I find some answers or give up, whichever comes first. You’ll find Part I here and Part III here.)   When last we met, it was August 1984, and Zutphen Brothers of Port Hood was sitting onRead More

CBRM Council held a relatively brief meeting on Tuesday morning that included a presentation from the municipal Water Utility on a proposed water rate hike. CBRM’s Water Utility, according to this handy description provided by the Utility and Review Board (UARB) back in 2017, is: …comprised of seven distinct areas,Read More

Food for thought Let’s start with a little game of “Okay, stop” with Sylvain Charlebois—professor in food distribution and policy and senior director of the AgriFood Analytics Lab at Dalhousie University and all-round media darling. Here he is on the question of whether Canada’s three leading grocers have been price-gougingRead More

I am an easily distracted human being who almost didn’t get beyond the second page of CBRM’s 2022 active transportation (AT) plan because it contained this quote:   I can’t remember whether I discovered the British writer and critic Leigh Hunt the summer I was obsessed with Victorian poetry (blameRead...

Editor’s Note: CBRM resident Guy LaFosse wonders why the municipality is not burying the power lines as part of its $10 million Charlotte Street makeover. He shared his letter to councilors with the Spectator.   Good afternoon Councilors, I am writing to you out of a growing concern that aRead...

There was—even cynical old me has to admit it—good news on the CBRM Central Library file during last night’s CBRM council meeting. In a memo to Council and staff, Mayor Amanda McDougall explained that the old Cape Breton County Courthouse in Sydney’s Wentworth Park (otherwise known as 70 Crescent Street)Read More

Spectator readers often have great ideas: case in point, Bill Roberts’ suggestion (contained in this August 24 Letter to the Editor) that it would be interesting to know how much the Halifax Regional Municipality (HRM) paid to bury utility lines as part of its revamp of Spring Garden Road. Roberts’Read More

Yesterday, in Newfoundland and Labrador, Canadian PM Justin Trudeau and German Chancellor Olaf Scholz signed what was initially billed as an “historic accord” but quickly downgraded to a “non-binding agreement” to encourage the production of green hydrogen in Eastern Canada for shipment to Germany, starting in 2025. Per the GlobeRead More