HALIFAX - Downtown Halifax has certainly gone through some changes in the past few years. While some of my favourite shops have come and gone, it's important to remember that in order for downtown to thrive, it's up to us to support the unique businesses, stores, and restaurants that call downtown home. Enter: The Big Day Downtown, a promotion from the Downtown Halifax Business Commission that highlights the great things to do in Halifax's downtown core. 30 bloggers received $100 and were unleashed onto the mean streets of Halifax with one simple instruction: to document what they did with the money. In the midst of moving from Woodside to Halifax, I actually found it hard to find the spare time to go out and spend the $100.  The dozens of unpacked boxes sometimes literally created a wall between me and the downtown shops I wanted to visit — only a 10-minute walk away from my new abode. After a weekend of hard work, I'm ready to head downtown today after work to spend the remaining $50. The first $50? Here's how I used it:

An abridged version of this article appeared in Spacing Magazine's 18th issue, 'Oh, The Spectacle'. HALIFAX - The relationship between farm and city has been an ongoing dialogue among market-goers in Halifax — a city whose geographic and psychogeographic proximity to agricultural vitality provides ample opportunity for food politics to rise to the fore. Every Saturday morning, in grand tradition, this dialogue meanders its way through the labyrinth-like, historic Alexander Keith’s brewery, the site of Halifax’s beloved farmers’ market. But, as of this Saturday, this dialogue (along with many local producers, chefs, artists and crafters) will move to the long awaited Seaport Farmers’ Market — a state-of-the-art, environmentally focused waterfront facility widely heralded as a groundbreaking new model in the realm of green building and local ingenuity.

HALIFAX - About 25 people gathered in front on the Halifax Farmers' Market last Saturday to take part in Halifax's Jane's Walk. This year's walk, "Change of (s)Pace," wandered through the downtown, stopping to muse about all kinds of transformations the city is undergoing. photo by Alison Creba Hosted by Spacing Atlantic contributors, we followed the participatory principle that everyone is an authority on their community.  Anyone interested was given the opportunity to share thoughts and knowledge on their neighborhoods and city, taking up the megaphone whenever the urge arose.

St. John's, Newfoundland and Labrador by earlesd, member of the Spacing Atlantic Flickr Pool

The [Re]Presenting Halifax series revisits historical and contemporary maps, diagrams and other interpretive readings of the Halifax region. See my first post for the full aims of this project and more information about contributing to the series. HALIFAX - Waterfront redevelopment has been a major focus of cities around the globe for decades. In the case of Halifax, it has been a process that has spanned decades. Halifax, much like Toronto, has struggled to find consensus for a waterfront redevelopment strategy. The plans and images presented here show two early visions for the renovation and revitalization of the Halifax waterfront. Although both plans may have had some influence on subsequent development, the future of the waterfront remains a contentious debate. [caption id="" align="alignnone" width="500" caption="The redevelopment proposal from the 1971 plan. In addition to the highrises along the waterfront, it is interesting to note the terraced residential infill proposed at the base of the Citadel (much of which is occupied by the Metro Centre today)."][/caption]

Squat rows of abandoned apartments circle an empty children's playground, buried by snow. These buildings have seen better days. Their dull brown, yellow, grey and dishwater green paint is fading. Most windows are shattered or boarded up, while metal fencing and a dozen 'No Trespassing' signs surround them. If you look into the horizon, you can see candy cane striped smoke stacks belching smoke and the outline of the A. Murray MacKay Bridge. Shannon Park, a dilapidated former military barracks, is one of the first things people ...

MONCTON - While driving towards Salisbury along the Riverview side of the Petitcodiac River I noticed some peculiar sign-age under the acronym LAPPA, imploring all who cared to read it to keep the causeway connecting Moncton with Riverview closed. Having become familiar with the plight of the river myself over the years, the sign struck me as odd. It was my understanding that the general consensus amongst concerned citizens was that the gates should be opened in an effort to restore the river.  So, as with anything of particular interest to my life, I Googled it. Before we get to my findings, a little background information if you will. The causeway was constructed as a means of connecting Moncton with the quickly expanding town of Riverview and, as is the case with many NB municipalities, foresight was a word not found in the City of Moncton’s dictionary. The causeway essentially pinched off the river, causing a massive buildup of silty sediment directly downstream. The river's tidal bore, once world renowned and allegedly surf-able, was reduced to little more than the trickle of an 80 year man with kidney stones. As can be imagined the local ecosystem was affected and the fauna — fish in particular — that had once flourished soon vanished. A new ecosystem has since grown in its place, namely that of Lake Petitcodiac, a fresh water headpond that amasses upriver of the causeway.

Cross-posted from Spacing Ottawa, by Michael Frojmovic OUTER SPACE - For those not familiar with local fare in Trinidad & Tobago, a mix of dried channa (chickpea), roasted peanuts and splitpeas is certainly one of the world’s great beer snacks. Accompanied by a cold Carib beer and a demi-caraffe of water served up in the air-conditioned lounge of the Hyatt Regency Hotel, they help nurse a tired pedestrian through the 15 minutes it takes to recover from an 30-minute evening walk through Port of Spain. Walking in Trinidad after sunset is not a common practice. If you travel on foot from New Town, through Woodbrook, to the Hyatt, you'll face long stretches of empty streets, punctuated by the odd vagrant, without even a single honk from taxi drivers. Even as the sun sets, the humidity remains oppressive. My own destination was Port of Spain’s newest waterfront development; specifically, the publicly accessible waterfront promenade.  A waterfront city, Port of Spain was designed – much as numerous Canadian and American cities – with its back turned to the water. From a pedestrian’s point of view, the waterfront was separated by walled-in port facilities, and a major 6-lane arterial roadway (Wrightson Road) which functions as a highway.