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Urban Space & Right to the City

Toronto’s new mayor’s $1 billion problem

Toronto's new progressive mayor Olivia Chow will be facing an immediate $1 billion deficit—and there’s no simple solution.

Understanding Inclusive Infrastructure Investment in Canada

The case for embedding inclusion in all infrastructure planning, from start to finish.

Breaker breaker

Lessons from communities across Canada that blocked truck convoys

We keep us safe

When the Freedom Convoy came to Ottawa it was community members who organized to keep one another safe.

Freedom from what?

On January 28, the city of Ottawa changed forever as a hate-fuelled convoy set up camp for what would become a 26-day occupation.

Standing up to blaring hate

When the first trucks rolled in on January 28, I knew something bad was coming our way. What I didn’t realize at the time was that nobody had a plan to stop them.

Grow through what you go through

Addressing and sorting through the Freedom Convoy's wreckage is a job that belongs to all white people in Canada.

Call for pitches: September/October 2022: Uncovering the role of REITs

38% of households in Canada rent their homes. So why isn't more attention paid to the investors who control up to one third of Canada's rental housing stock?

Settler Work: Equity and safety gaps in Canada's public transit systems

Exploring the structural, organizational and systemic barriers to equitable public transit service, using the Thunder Bay system as a case study.

Commuting by the numbers

How we commute was changing even before the pandemic began. If public transit is going to replace single passenger cars for the daily drive, understanding these shifts is critical.

Five resources to understand the future of transportation

Electric vehicles have emerged as the poster child of the zero-carbon economy. If we could only manage to replace all our internal combustion engines with batteries, it seems, we’d be well on our way to a greener world. But is achieving net-zero emissions really that straightforward? And is a society and economy dependent on personal vehicles—zero-emission though they may be—actually the future we aspire to?

An equitable recovery for Para Transpo

Para Transpo assumes that para riders’ time is not valuable, that they have few important obligations and that their lives should be limited due to mobility and accessibility needs.

Preventing a downward spiral for transit isn’t complicated

Convenient, accessible public transit isn’t a nice-to-have for cities. It’s an essential part of urban life and can’t be left to wither.

The future of Ottawa’s transit after the light rail debacle

I remember the excitement I felt when Ottawa’s long-awaited light rail train finally opened to the public. But what it promised and what it delivered turned out to be two very different realities. Why did this happen, and what does this mean for the future of Ottawa’s transit?

Free to ROAM: Fare-free public transportation arrives in Alberta

One solution to the transit death spiral is to make transit free for riders and find alternative funding. In the past decade, at least six towns in Canada have made public transit free on local routes, including three in Alberta.

All's fare?

Public transit budgets deserve better than farebox recovery revenue.