If you’re reading this in Nova Scotia in 2023 and you don’t have a family doctor or nurse practitioner, take this small grain of comfort: You’ve never been less alone. As of Nova Scotia Health’s latest report, there are now more than 129,000 Nova Scotians on the province’s waitlist for a primary care provider. That’s […]
Martin Bauman
Martin Bauman is an award-winning journalist and interviewer, whose work has appeared in the Globe and Mail, Calgary Herald, Capital Daily, and Waterloo Region Record, among other places. In 2020, he was named one of five “emergent” nonfiction writers by the RBC Taylor Prize. As host of the Story Untold Podcast, he has interviewed some of Canada's most notable figures, including Paralympian Rick Hansen, cave diver Jill Heinerth, and Juno Award-winner Shad. A passionate speaker and mental health advocate, Martin has been a youth panellist for the Canada-wide Spotlight on Invisible Disabilities Partnership and bicycled solo across Canada to raise funds for services in his hometown of Waterloo, Ont.
Posted inNews + Opinion
Alcohol and Gaming investigating Alehouse after Christmas Eve homicide
Nova Scotia’s alcohol and gambling regulator is probing the events surrounding Ryan Michael Sawyer’s death outside the Halifax Alehouse in the early morning hours of Dec. 24, The Coast can confirm. The province’s Alcohol, Gaming, Fuel and Tobacco division received a liquor licensing complaint against the Alehouse (a historic-themed tavern at 1717 Brunswick Street) on […]
Posted inFood + Drink
Good Robot’s opening a new space next to the Halifax Common—and the brewery wants your input
Halifax’s north end is getting another brewery space. Good Robot’s co-founders have taken over the former Hook ‘Em and Cook ‘Em seafood bar at 2223 North Park Street, The Coast has learned. And while there’s no firm news on when the site might reopen under Good Robot’s stewardship—nor whether it will bear the same Good […]
Posted inFood + Drink
6 new Halifax restaurants and cafes to get your mouth watering in 2023
The Atlantic Ocean never rests—and neither does Halifax’s food scene. Our harbour city may be smaller than some of its Canadian peers, but damn if it doesn’t punch above its weight when it comes to dining out. If you followed Halifax’s food happenings in 2022, it seemed like every other week arrived with the opening […]
Posted inNews + Opinion
Halifax’s year in sports
If you were looking for an exclamation point for Halifax’s year in sports, you could do worse than Aug. 20, 2022. On a gorgeous summer day, if just for a moment, you could close your eyes and dream of a city of champions. Thousands gathered, cell phones outstretched, for a glimpse of the Stanley Cup. […]
Posted inArts + Music
We picked the best Christmas movie of all time. It’s a close call.
In this line of work, you have to maintain some level of objectivity. The pursuit of truth demands no less: You present the facts, such as they are, and let a reader come to their own conclusions. And so, when we set about discussing the best Christmas movies at The Coast’s office this week, we […]
Posted inFood + Drink
Halifax’s year in food was a whole smorgasbord
Call it anything you want, but Halifax’s year of cafe, bar and restaurant openings, closings, re-openings and industry gossip certainly wasn’t boring. The year 2022 brought our fine Atlantic city a chef’s plateful of new waterfront restaurants, a weeklong war over pizza, an ownership change to a north end institution and a labour shortage (or […]
Posted inNews + Opinion
Halifax’s short-term rental dilemma
Bill Stewart remembers The Hydrostone before the short-term rentals arrived. He and his partner, Mary Reardon, have called the north end Halifax neighbourhood home since the late 1990s. It’s always had its charm, he says: English-style row homes open onto wide, treed boulevards of Norway maples and European lindens. Gardens teem with flowers; conversation spills […]
Posted inNews + Opinion
Halifax faces “heck of a crisis” as unhoused brace for cold winter
Two words come to mind when Laura Patterson describes tenting in the winter: “Fucking horrible.” The housing advocate and lifelong Halifax resident spent October through March last year supporting people sleeping rough at People’s Park. For six months, Patterson and a rotating cast of four to six volunteers would trade shifts at the now-vacant tent […]
Posted inNews + Opinion
Take a look inside Halifax’s first barbershop on wheels
It’s a frostbitten Wednesday afternoon on Gottingen Street, and barber Mohammad Nabelsi has a hair trimmer trained on the back of his latest client’s neck. From inside his mobile barbershop—a Ford Transit van converted into a full-service haircutting setup—the Damascus-raised Nabelsi glances at the mirror and adjusts his clippers’ settings. Dressed in a white button-down, […]
Posted inNews + Opinion
How the DND chose Hartlen Point for its planned warship testing site
The Canadian military’s choice of a future land-based warship testing facility has rankled neighbours, fishers and environmentalists alike. And a third-party site selection review leaves further questions, according to documents The Coast has reviewed. The 202-page report, prepared by Irving Shipbuilding Inc. for the Department of National Defence, weighs the pros and cons of Hartlen […]
Posted inNews + Opinion
Nova Scotia offers carbon pricing system—and little else—in latest climate action plan
Nova Scotia’s government is ready to take drastic steps toward reducing its carbon footprint—just not until 2030, thank you very much. Or so was the gist of the province’s newest Our Climate, Our Future report, a climate change plan that will guide the government’s actions over the coming decade. On Wednesday afternoon, Nova Scotia’s environment […]