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There has been a concerted push in Quebec to name more things after women, and I'm sure that factored into the CDPQ's decision making. I don't doubt CTCUM planners avoided English names but the language situation isn't quite the same today as it was in the 70s and 80s, and the CDPQ is much less...

I'm glad Begratto had a good experience on the Pie-IX SRB but I'm personally disappointed at how it turned out. There are no ticket machines at the stations, and most importantly, service is extremely limited in evenings and weekends. This was promised as a line offering metro-like service which...

Not really. There are other English names on the REM line, like Kirkland, Sunnybrooke, Fairview, Griffintown, etc. My guess is that the planners wanted a station name with symbolic significance – Marie Curie was a woman who made world-changing scientific achievements. (It would have been fun if...

If you're in Montreal in the winter you'll notice far fewer plastic bollards because they're removed to make things easier for snow removal. This is also why Montreal doesn't use portable curbs as often – there are concerns they'll be damaged during snow clearance operations. But the city is...

Many of these photos were taken in Mongkok, actually, and there are a few from Mid-Levels (which isn't much of an attraction --- it's a mostly residential area and not too interesting at street-level) and the Temple Street night market. Don't forget, I have many more photos coming...

Hong Kong's built environment is definitely not beautiful in any conventional way, but I actually like a lot of the buildings from the 1950s and 60s. They're well-proportioned and often very graceful, with rounded corners and stylish windows. They also meet the street in a very nice way.

I've been away for awhile. It's for good reason, I promise! First, in late February, my girlfriend and I took the train to New York, where we stayed with some family friends for a few days. Then we flew to Hong Kong, where we stayed until the first week of April, with a couple of weekends spent...

Some of the gags are silly but, on the whole, I thought this was a pretty brilliant satire of a quintessentially suburban sport. Maybe I'm reading too much into it but, as others have noted, this particular sketch has a lot in common with today's flashmobs.

I've been to Ottawa and they're very similar cities in terms of scale and urbanity. Obviously Calgary is a lot more modern but it isn't any more suburban.

I was in Calgary two weeks ago to visit my family for a week. February is hardly the best time to wander around and time photos but, well, that's what I got. Now please enjoy these Oil-Rich Photos from Canada's Fastest Growing City, etc.

Montreal ran into trouble when it tried to designate the entire length of St. Denis Street as a tourist zone, which would have completely de-regulated store hours. Nearby residents complained, somehow imagining that every store would be open 24 hours and the noise and crowds would be endless...

I definitely understand what you mean. Montreal and Toronto are actually pretty comparable: they're both messy, ugly but creative and culturally dynamic.

Paris is a whole lot edgier and more creative than Boston...

Yeah, it's the Sunset Grill & Tap. It sounds corny, and the decor is even cheesier, but it's worth it. I've been to Dieu du Ciel many times. It's very popular, especially with McGill and UdeM students, and hard to get a table on any night of the week. But it's worth it --- they have some...

Canadian cities have always been a lot more complex and multifaceted than we assume. This is true for Montreal, Vancouver, Calgary, etc., but it's especially true for Toronto, which suffers from the myth that it was once an entirely homogenous backwater.

On a chilly weekend in mid-November, I went down to Boston for a weekend with my girlfriend and a friend. We rented a Toyota Yaris, drive down on Friday afternoon and then left on Sunday evening. This was my seventh trip to Boston, but my first visit since 1999. Boston was the first "real"...

If you look at the maps of Toronto and Montreal from the 1970s, you'll notice that both had huge areas of 12,000 ppl/km2 that have since disappeared. In Toronto this was somewhere in the west end and in Montreal, it covered the entire central-east part of the city. What's up with that? Decrease...

Is that the only Café Crêpe in Toronto? I was a bit surprised to see it because they're everywhere in Vancouver.

Tonight I had dinner at Halal 786, a delicious Pakistani restaurant in Park Extension (Montreal's equivalent to Gerrard India Bazaar, except bigger). It was great --- their Lahori fried fish is really fantastic --- and it doesn't surprise me that it has such a hardcore following. I was...

Here's an AP story (via NY Times) about the cardboard buns.