11 people are in the race to be the new boss of Winnipeg. Although one candidate has more name recognition and support in the polls, the winner is not quite a foregone conclusion. I find it refreshing to have a civic election where there is no incumbent mayor and many different visions and personalities to…
A couple of years ago the government of Manitoba announced that it was going to upgrade the South Perimeter Highway. Work has begun. This whole summer equipment has been digging and plowing and getting land ready for new split-grade intersections at the St. Anne’s Rd. and St. Mary’s Rd crossings of the Perimeter. Yes!! It’s…
The future of the Blumberg golf complex has been uncertain for the better part of a decade. It was 2013 when the city-owned property outside of city limits was declared surplus. Throughout that time the complex, which includes an 18 hole and a 9 hole golf course, has managed to evade the wrecking ball, but…
One Million is a nice round number. It is the unofficial population benchmark of a Big City. It is also the number of trees that Winnipeg Mayor Brian Bowman once pledged to plant. But between destructive bugs, an underfunded tree program and infill development, it may take a million years to get there. How do…
The momentum behind a movement to reduce residential speed limits is building, not just in Winnipeg but in larger cities all over the world. Calgary city council recently voted to reduce their residential speed limit to 40 km/h. The UN and WHO are pushing for reduced residential speeds. Outspoken individuals and advocacy groups have sprung…
Winnipeg City Council might be on the verge of condemning a vast area of central Winnipeg to being a concrete wasteland for decades to come. The area in question is the former site of the Winnipeg Stadium adjacent to the Polo Park mall. Two development companies have proposed an elaborate project, integrated with the Polo…
It’s been over 12 years since a rag-tag group of millionaires banded together to stop a high-rise apartment complex from being built on a surface parking lot in downtown Winnipeg. The promise was that the parking lot, adjacent to the former site of historic Upper Fort Garry, would become an interpretive centre — part of…
On September 24, MPI issued a warning that 2019 was trending towards a new record for pedestrian fatalities in Manitoba in a single year. For every fatality there are on average over 13 injuries, according to MPI’s data. A week ago, two more pedestrians were hit by a driver and sent to the hospital in…
Winnipeg has a rich history of illegal and offensive parking lots. There is, for example, the case of ‘Jelly Bean Park’ whereby a quaint little park on Portage Avenue was converted into a primitive gravel parking lot in a business deal involving convicted cocaine trafficker Ray Rybachuk prior to his mysterious death by snowmobile accident.…
In my previous blog post (here) I did my best to explain why I thought it was important to open up Winnipeg’s “iconic” Portage and Main intersection. Portage and Main, the only square that Manitoba has ever had on the Canadian Monopoly board, is in reality a blight on downtown Winnipeg and an impediment to…
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