Vancouver’s Northeast False Creek plan continues to wind its way through the system, generating ripples of unease about the high amount of density being allowed in that neighbourhood. That’s in a part of town where you wouldn’t really have to buy a ticket to U2 or anyone else who played in the stadium there, since […]

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Just in time, yet another news release is issued on the city’s favourite one-kilometre stretch of news, the Burrard Bridge and its bike lane. The mayor’s office issued Bulletin 23 today, with polling results showing everyone in Vancouver wants to kiss a cyclist. Well, something like that. (See exact wording below, plus the city report […]

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Every time I turn around, Surrey is doing some new thing that no one could have predicted 10 years ago: a multicultural music festival, a sobering centre, a bike park, a homelessness action plan. The latest is a design competition for the gigantic municipality’s future neighbourhood centres. (See news release below.) One day, a design […]

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My favourite kinds of stories are the ones that break stereotypes. In my fantasy world, we’d constantly be covering stories about Calgarians having the highest rate of art-museum visitorship in the country, Torontonians taking more yoga classes than anyone else, single mothers being more likely to get promotions to management positions and the like. So […]

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I see that the Caption Contest has been a roaring success, thanks to the creativity of a number of you. Perhaps I should make it a regular feature. Then we could have weekly votes on the best caption with prizes awarded: Framed copies of original Penny Ballem internal emails, a chance to blog under my […]

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Words fail me as I look upon this recent transmission of our mayor’s activities from London. I hope you are not similarly afflicted. Please send your best efforts at a caption that could capture the spirit of whatever the heck is going on here. (Those familiar with the New Yorker’s cartoon caption contests will know […]

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Two nights, two art spaces, two different gatherings, and yet some parallels. Friday night, an eclectic group of people gathered at the Vancouver Centre for Contemporary Asian Art to say goodbye to Donald MacPherson, the city-hall drug-policy co-ordinator for the last nine years, who announced last month that he was off to new adventures (still […]

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The oldest building in Chinatown is going to be the gathering point for a collection of who’s whos tonight, as people from the art world, the media world, the developer world and the political world gather at Bob Rennie’s new art museum. My feature story on Bob and his new role, along with the museum, […]

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Just an update for those not watching other media, but this is what came out of the TransLink Mayors Council meeting today as reported in advance by the region’s hardest-working reporter, Jeff Nagel, and today by the Vancouver Sun’s transportation reporter, Kelly Sinoski.

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Mayor Gregor Robertson launched the city’s green plan at the Resilient Cities conference yesterday, plus it got presented at council. You’re welcome to peruse the multiple pages and post your thoughts. I have to say, I am still confused by some parts of it. Perhaps I need to do more homework, but it’s not intuitive […]

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