[PHOTO] Three photos of the night in Toronto

The tree light up brightly in blue and green is on Bloor Street East; the night shot was taken south on Bartlett Aveue looking past the tracks; the last photo, black and black, was taken looking past the trees in my backyard.

[BLOG] Some Sunday links

• The Broadside Blog's Caitlin Kelly raves about The Alienist. I certainly did like the Caleb Carr original novel, myself.


• Crooked Timber asks whether immigration laws should be respected, if they are the sorts of laws that should be respected.


• D-Brief takes a look at the rain Cassini detected falling from the rings of Saturn onto the planet they orbit.


• Drew Ex Machina's Andrew LePage takes a look at the Juno V and the birth of the Saturn rocket family.


• At A Fistful of Euros, Alex Harrowell notes how the Greens in Germany seem to be benefiting from the problems of the CSU.


• Marginal Revolution notes how the retaliatory tariffs of China are targeting the economies of Trump-supporting regions of the United States.


• Drew Rowsome reports on Mar, a gay erotic horror film from Portugal.


• Starts With A Bang's Ethan Siegel explains why information loss from black holes is a problem.


• Window on Eurasia notes the trade of illegal loggers in Russia with Chinese buyers.

[URBAN NOTE] Five Toronto links: fiscal, #topoli, King streetcar, Yonge Street Mall

• Matt Elliott at CBC Toronto suggests that Toronto has a fiscal crunch ahead, needing to spend more than 30 billion years on various projects over the next decade without knowing where the money will come from. Why is this not more of an issue?


• Enzo DiMatteo at NOW Toronto takes a look at election-related news in Toronto, among other things noting that the campaign of Jennifer Keesmaat does not seem to be taking off.


• The 504 King streetcar route will be split into two, to allow for better traffic flows. CBC reports.


• This 2017 Spacing article on the failure of the pedestrian movement in the Yonge Street Mall is enlightening.


• Katherine Taylor at NOW Toronto writes about some remnants of the past of Toronto, in buildings and signs and neighbourhood memories.

[URBAN NOTE] Five city links: Montréal, New York City, Espíritu Pampa, London, Skopje

• People around Beaudry station in Montréal, in the middle of the Village gay, are preparing for that station's protracted shutdown. Global News reports.


• I, for one, approve entirely of the idea of a squirrel census in New York City's Central Park. Global News reports.


• This report in the Guardian on the lost Inca city of Espíritu Pampa, famed for its resistance to the conquistadors and only recently uncovered, tells an amazing story.


• CityLab notes how non-Londoner British often feel shut out by the high cost of living and lack of affordable housing in London.


• This CityLab article takes a look at the modernist architecture in the North Macedonian capital of Skopje, largely rebuilt after a devastating 1960s earthquake.

[NEWS] Some economics links: Québec, Canada, Mexico, United States, Poland and China

• Despite strong economic growth recently, it is unlikely that the CAQ will be able to fulfill its promise to make Québec no longer a net receiver of equalization payments. The National Post reports.


• Canadians may well be relieved that NAFTA has been superseded smoothly enough by the USMCA, but Canadians are also not forgetting their country's treatment by the Trump Administration. The Canadian Press, via CTV News, reports.


• MacLean's explains the NAFTA/USMCA situation from the perspective of Mexicans, who seem to have felt their country simply did not have many good choices.


• Do the wage increases given to workers by Amazon promise higher wages for American workers more generally and a strong economy? Maybe, maybe not. CBC's Don Pittis reports.


• So far, Poland has not benefited as much as it might hope from Chinese investments in the country. Transitions Online reports.

[NEWS] Four Mars links: Phobos and Deimos, meteorites, fossae, life

• D-Brief reports on one new compelling theory suggesting that the Martian moons of Phobos and Deimos are not captured asteroids, but rather debris cast into orbit by a big impact on Mars.


• Starts With A Bang's Ethan Siegel notes that bits of Mars tossed off by asteroid impacts have made it as far as Earth.


• Bad Astronomer Phil Plait notes the strange fossae of Mars, mysterious cracks in the planet's surface.


• D-Brief notes a new paper suggesting that, in Mars' relatively warm youth, life might well have found a home in its crust for hundreds of millions of years.