Since it was announced the NSCC Marconi Campus would move from its location next to Cape Breton University to the Sydney waterfront, I have been curious as to how the site was chosen — and what other sites were considered. Last week, I got the answer to the second partRead More

I have an update on last week’s district energy study story, with some information gleaned from the Federation of Canadian Municipalities (FCM). The full cost of the study was $175,400. The CBRM and Enwave Energy applied to the FCM for funding (with the CBRM as “lead applicant”) and received $74,700Read More

If you were a cash-strapped community of communities looking to cut your greenhouse gas emissions and had $100,000 to spend, how would you spend it? Would you blow the boodle on a preliminary study for a “district heating and cooling system” in Sydney’s downtown core? A system that would serviceRead More

Editor’s Note: Be sure to read the follow-up to this story in the 5 February 2020 edition.   Biomess The requirement in Nova Scotia is that emissions are reported as total emissions less the portion from biomass. For this reason, the contribution from a biomass plant to the project couldRead More

“Doublethink,” a term coined by George Orwell in 1984 (the book, not the year), is defined by the American Heritage Dictionary as “believing two contradictory ideas at the same time” and I think it describes the CBRM’s approach to waterfront development. This past week, I had reason to have aRead More

Sea change A spectator (you know who you are) pointed me to this item from the tender for architectural and engineering services for the new Marconi Campus on the Sydney waterfront (before, I might add, it was also picked up on by the Cape Breton Post): Climate risks include increasedRead More

Grandstanding Okay, so on Tuesday, as I was burrowing through the documents I’d received from the feds relating to the 2012 sale of the Royal Cape Breton Yacht Club, I thought I might try to follow the CBRM Council meeting about the library at the same time. (You know howRead More

Monday’s announcement about new capital projects at three Nova Scotia Community College (NSCC) campuses got me to wondering about the status of the feasibility study into moving the NSCC Marconi Campus to Downtown Sydney. In case you missed the announcement, the three projects — worth an estimated $24 million —Read More

New Liberry I went to that Open House session on the new central library last night and I will have more to say next week but I just had to note that I heard no good explanation for why the public library has been stuffed, like a pimento, in theRead More

I have been trying to determine how, exactly, we decided to locate the new CBRM central library on the Sydney waterfront and as best I can figure, it happened like this:   Architectural & Facility Planning In June 2011, the Cape Breton Regional Library (CBRL) Board initiated a study toRead More