🦇 It’s #BatWeek! Ontario is home to 8 bat species and heartbreakingly, 7 are now endangered. From pest control to pollination, bats keep our ecosystems in balance. Let’s protect the night’s unsung heroes. 🌙
Learn more here:
onnaturemagazine.com/bat-guide.html
#bats #OntarioNature

The big crime lie Crime is down but spending on cops and security is up. Why?

If crime is way down, why are Canadians so afraid of crime? And what are politicians funnelling money into? My latest -- they are boosting policing to police us ... not keep us safe (unless you're rich, which trust me, you are not.)

noraloreto.substack.com/p/the-big-cr...

4 kids in halloween costumes Road safety is your responsibility not theirs

For our cities, police and any other voices of authority.

Just want to get ahead of the kid shaming content that's coming this Halloween. @thebikinglawyer.bsky.social

How Toronto Forgets Its History (Again) - Spacing Toronto The north portion of St. Lawrence Market is arguably the second most historic spot in the post-colonial city, after Fort York. A public market has been operating there continuously since 1803, which i...

"This sorry episode demonstrates not just how Toronto forgets its past, but also how the city manages to forget how it forgets its past." @johnlorinc.bsky.social is rightly outraged at the way the new market building ignores the site's significant history spacing.ca/toronto/2025...

It's that time of year again, welcome back to school kiddos! This week we're going to address Toronto's back to school/micro mobility campaign & ask that they direct all available resources at dangerous drivers who cause hundreds of serious injuries & deaths each year in TO. 📷 @tomflood.bsky.social

Doug Ford: what can I do to get more drivers on the road?
-add lanes attracting more drivers
-don't finish major transit projects, give no info on why
-rip out bike lanes
-send all civil servants back to work 5 days a week

Edward Keenan: On traffic congestion, Doug Ford has tried nothing — and he’s all out of ideas The premier ignores the Fundamental Law of Road Congestion at every Ontario commuter's peril.

Brilliant column by @thekeenanwire.bsky.social which ridicules Doug Ford's pro-car policies. That along with forcing public servants in office, attacking #BikeTO lanes & fumbling transit projects and he's better off being called "pro-congestion". #TTC #TOpoli #ONpoli www.thestar.com/opinion/star...

Toronto Parks Need a Reboot - Spacing Toronto Recent Auditor General reports exposed deep-rooted inefficiencies and systemic issues in Toronto’s Parks & Recreation (P&R) Division. Despite these challenges, P&R is staffed by many dedicated public ...

As Toronto's parks department searches for a new general manager of Parks while facing criticism from the Auditor General, landscape architect Fadi Masoud offers proposals for how to revitalize Toronto's green spaces. spacing.ca/toronto/2025...

Bike Lanes: 2 - Ford Nation: 0 - Spacing Toronto In an intriguing aside a third of the way into Justice Paul Schabas’ extraordinary decision (issued yesterday) in Toronto’s bike lane war with Premier Doug Ford, he reveals how, about a month ago, he ...

#topoli #onpoli New from me in @spacing: Some reflections on @cycletoronto.bsky.social’s huge legal victory in the bike lane war with Ford Nation. spacing.ca/toronto/2025...

Mark Carney is going “elbows down” against Big Tech Canada’s AI agenda ignores potential harms in the hope of short-term economic gain

Mark Carney wants economic growth at any cost. To achieve it, he’s going after tech investment and pushing hard for AI adoption.

In the process, AI regulations are being thrown on the bonfire and tech harms are an afterthought. It’s a recipe for disaster.

So much for ‘Canada strong’: Mark Carney’s cuts to the public service are a brutal trade-off The Liberals are pondering cuts so deep, they’ll outdo the Harper government and rival Paul Martin.

Op-ed from @davidmaccdn.bsky.social "...these cuts will easily be the biggest items in the fall budget. Any resultant “savings” will go toward more defence spending, as well as tax cuts for the middle and upper classes. It’s a brutal trade-off." @policyalternatives.ca www.thestar.com/opinion/cont...

Toronto’s speed cameras have reduced speeding, aggressive driving by almost half: new SickKids report Study looks at 250 different locations across Toronto from July 2020 and December 2022.

A new report from @sickkidsto.bsky.social found speed cameras reduce speeding and aggressive driving by almost half; thus making the streets safer for #BikeTO & #WalkTO. #TOpoli #VisionZero www.thestar.com/news/toronto...

The Breathing Lands: Getting Burned by the Ring of Fire With the Trump administration's threat to Canada, companies and politicians are falling over themselves to secure Prime Minister Carney's support for the next "nation-building" mega-project.

What you need to know about the Ring of Fire.
This is not a nation-building exercise.
For many years as a politician I was a booster of this massive project in the fragile wetlands. I turned to doubt and then opposition over the huge impacts on the land.
charlieangus.substack.com/p/the-breath...

Montreal and Toronto Shatter Cycling Records in Major Bike Boom Canada's two largest bike share systems hit records this month, demonstrating their importance to the rest of the country and North America.

This is the Way: Montreal and Toronto Shatter Bike Share Cycling Records.
momentummag.com/montreal-and...

How Metrolinx’s plan to deliver European-style train service went off the rails GO Expansion will still transform Greater Golden Horseshoe transit — but likely won’t be as ambitious as what was planned just three years ago

absolutely brutal reporting from @jackhauen.bsky.social about the collapse in ambition of GO rail expansion happening under this government www.thetrillium.ca/news/the-tri...

Save the County by Burning the Planet Canada's False National "Unity" Debate

Canada is on fire.
The national media is focused on building pipelines for national unity.
Oil production is at record levels.
We are back of the pack in the G7 for failing all our environmental goals.
My latest on Canada's oil obsession.

charlieangus.substack.com/p/burn-the-p...

Protected bike lanes have a near-magical ability to produce cyclists.

This new study of 28 US cities finds that census block groups w/protected bike lanes expanded bike commuting almost 2x faster than those w/standard bike lanes & >4x faster than those w/o new lanes.

www.nature.com/articles/s44...

It’s Friday, we’re in love 🖤

Have a great weekend Westenders!

How Carney Can Actually Reduce Violent Crime | The Tyee Instead of overreliance on policing and incarceration, Canada’s new PM should lead with these proven and effective actions.

Canada needs a federal minister responsible for the prevention of violent crime, supported by a deputy minister with no other responsibilities.

The successes in other countries suggest this approach could reduce serious crime by 50 per cent in the next five years, write two experts.

Koriko Koriko  (コリコ) is the city in Kiki's Delivery Service. It's the main setting of the film and the place where Kiki settles as a witch-in-training. It is spelled Corico in the film's official artbook, an...

Ghibli films - thinking of Kiki's Delivery Service in particular. Apparently the city is meant to be "how the Japanese imagine an old European city." ghibli.fandom.com/wiki/Koriko

Reversing the Ford government's biking backlash - Spacing Toronto At a time when Washington has launched a scorched earth attack on virtually all federal climate policies, the Ford government’s hyper-partisan campaign to tear out Toronto bike lanes feels, well, posi...

#topoli #onpoli Today on @spacing - How to dial back Ford’s bike land attacks with empirical policy research. spacing.ca/toronto/2025...

We've joined Bluesky to connect to everyone who loves nature. For our inaugural post on #EndangeredSpeciesDay, we encourage everyone to sign our petition to tell Premier Ford to strengthen, don't scrap, the Endangered Species Act.
Stop Bill 5.
✍️ ontarionature.org/bill-5-alert
Please share widely!

🛑 Stop Ford’s reckless power grab 🛑

As Trump threatens us, Ford’s response is to grab Trump-like powers. #Bill5 has little to do with tariffs & everything to do with clearing the legislative & regulatory paths for development.

Say NO to Bill 5: buff.ly/3ieIi9C

"The substance of [Bill 5] does not protect Ontario; it pulverizes it"

Check out @tanyatalaga.bsky.social ’s opinion piece on Ford’s latest attack on the environment, Indigenous rights & democracy—and how it mirrors the very threat he claims to be defending Canadians against: bit.ly/435jDvZ

#Bill5 has little to do with Trump tariffs & everything to do with recklessly clearing legislative & regulatory paths for development.

It creates vague “special economic zones” exempt from laws. Say NO to Ford’s dangerous deregulation path: buff.ly/3ieIi9C

#stopbill5 #onpoli #protectnature

Also obscures that wealthier people own more cars, drive more often. Now they have more incentive to drive more, congest roads, and buy less fuel efficient vehicles. Wealthy will probably save much more, whereas the poorest will save nothing or very little.

Some quick math:
155,303 million VKT in Ontario 2022
/11,164,837 licensed drivers
= 13,910 per driver
about 10M registered vehicles, so about 15k - just over 1000 km per month. Assuming 2 car household still leaves 1000km short. Also, avg household only owns 1.5 cars. www.ontario.ca/files/2024-0...

Doug Ford said he would protect Ontario, so why is he doing the opposite? Rather than saving us from the threat of Trump, Ford's Bill 5 actually mirrors the U.S. Administration's play to slash environmental protections and exempts companies from all labour, occupational hea...

. @canadagray.bsky.social: Premier Ford ran for a third term laser-focused on promising to save us all from Donald Trump.

So why now does it seem that protecting us from the U.S. involves slashing environmental laws and giving special powers to his friends?

www.thestar.com/opinion/cont...

Shawn Micallef: Vehicles have become weapons by design — and public space is in their crosshairs A culture like ours weaponizes vehicles — from the way they are designed to the way the roads they run on are designed.

Cars, trucks & SUVs have become driver weapons. Sometimes intentionally, sometimes in the way streets & vehicles are designed. We should admit that we are very much OK w a certain amount of death & life-changing injuries in order to not inconvenience driving. My column this week. Pls read n share.

listening to carney’s first press conference, and god damn that guy has such a right-wing policy program: cutting immigration, cracking down on criminals, deregulation, cutting government spending, more subsidies for private sector, and it goes on.

even getting the king over is pretty conservative.