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, […]
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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 […]
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A year into omicron, Dr. Strang wants to talk flu
According to the province’s count, we are currently in the seventh wave of COVID infections. The first started March 1, 2020, with the earliest known cases in Nova Scotia announced March 15. The pandemic’s omicron era arrived in Nova Scotia on December 8, 2021, making Thursday the first omicronniversary. It’s been a year marked by […]
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How Sobeys and Superstore legally steal from small businesses
The sun is streaming in through a large bay window in front of the house. The phone sits on the table, its cracked screen protector throwing weird reflections on the wall. The phone is on speaker with a recorder set up by the mic. “Do you mind if I record this conversation?” I ask. The […]
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Could women’s pro soccer find a home in Halifax?
Canada’s greatest soccer player of all time has a message for the sport: Women’s pro soccer belongs in this country—and it’s coming soon. On Monday night, FIFA’s all-time leading goal scorer, Christine Sinclair, joined her former national teammate Diana Matheson on CBC’s The National to announce they’ve been working on a first-of-its-kind domestic women’s professional […]
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Road work on the $122.6M Cogswell District is underway. How’s that going?
It might be hard to believe when staring at the mound of rubble along Barrington Street north of Cogswell, but Halifax is one day away from one of its first key milestones in a landmark downtown redevelopment effort. Road crews are nearly finished work on a detour that will last 18 months as developers clear […]
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The suburbs are a Ponzi scheme
The city’s budget pre-season is done. Friday’s budget committee meeting of Halifax regional council brought the preparations for next year’s budget to an end, with council giving chief financial officer Jerry Blackwood and chief administrative officer Jaques Dubé their marching orders. The senior staffers will come back in a few weeks with information, suggestions and […]
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HFX Wanderers announce Patrice Gheisar as soccer club’s new head coach
Derek Martin has something to smile about. On the last day of November, as the frost melts across Halifax, the HFX Wanderers FC founder and president is grinning as he greets reporters at the club’s Sackville Street office and holds forth on his soccer club’s future. For the first time in the Wanderers’ four-year history […]
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Military facility at Hartlen Point could ruin area for birding, surfing, fishing
It’s a blustery November morning, and Nikki Gullett has her binoculars trained on the whitecapped waters off the edge of Cow Bay. An avid bird watcher, she’s been tracing the path of a possible red-throated loon, one of the more than 300 bird species found at Hartlen Point, a rocky and dune-covered outcrop at the […]
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Psychedelics are becoming big business. Is Nova Scotia ready?
The glitzy hotel conference room surroundings said as much about psychedelics’ rise to mainstream interest as anything else. In the basement of the Atlantica Hotel in mid-November, a group of 30-odd academics, therapists, mycologists and MBAs mingled to discuss the latest research and commercial forays into magic mushrooms, MDMA and other psychedelic tools of therapeutic […]
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Macdonald Bridge bike flyover delayed to 2024
Cyclists travelling the Macdonald Bridge between Halifax and Dartmouth will need to wait two more years for a Halifax-end bikeway flyover that was initially targeted for completion in 2021. In a report submitted to Halifax regional council ahead of Tuesday’s council meeting, HRM project manager Ahmed Allahham notes that delays to the project—which cyclists have […]
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Colorado mass shooting echoes in Halifax
The 3,443 kilometre distance separating Halifax from Colorado Springs felt awfully small on Sunday evening, as about two dozen vigil attendees gathered at the Peace and Friendship Park to mark the annual Transgender Day of Remembrance. As trans people and their allies mourned those lost to transphobic-rooted violence over the years, many couldn’t help but […]