[PHOTO] Four photos of flowers for sale at 77 Food Market, Dovercourt Village

One thing I love about spring is the sight of the banks of flowers for sale outside my neighbourhood's corner stores, like 77 Food Market at Dovercourt and Hallam. The bright natural colours of the flowers cheer me, remind me life is here again.

[URBAN NOTE] Five Toronto links: walking on Yonge, Ford Country, Doug Ford, Finch West, Airbnb

• John Lorinc considers walking in Toronto, on Yonge Street, in the wake of the van attack, over at Spacing.


• This classic Toronto Life tour of "Ford Country", the Toronto landmarks in the career of the Ford brothers, is quite relevant in this election year.


• Royson James is quite right to note the limit of Rob Ford's outreach towards black and other minority youth, over at the Toronto Star.


• blogTO reports on the start of construction of the Finch West LRT line. I sincerely hope it won't be disrupted by election year change in the way the Eglinton subway was by the Harris government.


• Sean Grisdale at Spacing notes the highly concentrated, and negative, impact of Airbnb on housing in downtown Toronto neighbourhoods.

[URBAN NOTE] Five city links: New York City, Niagara Falls, Seattle, Boston, Toronto vs Montréal

• VICE notes that Airbnb is also having a negative impact on certain neighbourhoods in New York City.


• It may be necessary to put up barricades at Niagara Falls, but it's still sad. CBC reports.


• Is Seattle the latest city at risk of being priced out of range of most locals? This Seattle Times opinion piece makes the case.


• This Toronto Life ad suggesting things to do in a four-day stay in Boston makes that city look wonderful. One day ...


• Why not write an opera about the hockey rivalry between Toronto and Montréal? CBC reports.

[ISL] Five Island links: Mi'kmaq UPEI, old-style boats, economic split, global warming, LGBTQ

• CBC reports how the Mi'kmaq flag now flies high, and permanently, above the campus of UPEI. Well done!


• An eastern PEI shipbuilder is creating an old-style wooden boat using traditional methods. CBC reports.


• The division of PEI into two zones for employment insurance purposes, between greater Charlottetown and the rest of the Island, can be unfair to people in Charlottetown. It also reflects real economic divisions in the province. CBC reports.


• When Atlantic Canada's summers become as hot as Ontario's thanks to global warming, I wonder what Ontario's will be like? Global News reports.


• A recent conference in Charlottetown featured long-standing Island activists Jim Culbert and Nola Etkin, explaining their queer lives in the province. The Guardian reports.

[ISL[ Five islands links: Devil's Island, Hainan, Hashima, Newfoundland, global warming floods

• Business Insider shares some haunting photos of the old French prison island of Devil's Island, in French Guiana, here.


• China is authorizing a horse lottery for its tourist-heavy southern tropical island of Hainan. Bloomberg reports.


• National Geographic shares photos of Japan's Hashima Island, once a densely inhabited industrial conurbation and now at risk of succumbing entirely.


• A fixed link between the island of Newfoundland and the Canadian mainland--more precisely, a rail link connecting the Northern Peninsula to a new route on the adjacent Labrador shore--may well be a viable proposal. CBC reports.


• The worsening of wave-induced flooding on tropical islands might well make very many uninhabitable, by contaminating their water tables. National Geographic reports.