Writing
Meat and Potatoes
My thoughts on Ward 9, and beyond.
June 3, 2026
High-Density Housing on Colonel Talbot: my objection, and how to file yours before June 9
On June 9, the Planning and Environment Committee considers a plan for six-storey apartment buildings and up to 100 units per hectare at 3924, 4012 and 4050 Colonel Talbot Road in Lambeth, beyond what the City's own Secondary Plan allows and filed without the traffic, servicing and school evidence the Plan requires. Here is the objection I filed, and how you can file your own before the deadline.
Read →May 23, 2026
London City Council Gets Paid HOW MUCH?
On November 4, 2025, a majority of London City Council voted nine to six to reset councillor base pay to the seventieth percentile of full-time employment income for Londoners. The base salary jumps from about $67,000 to about $94,000 at the start of the next council term. Here is who voted yes, who voted no, what the rules say about how council pay gets set, and the gap that none of them closed.
Read →May 17, 2026
The Canary in the Forest City
London's distress is a blaring siren that every city in Canada should heed. Our unemployment rate hit 9.2% in April, the highest of any large city in this country, and the ninth straight month it's climbed. 13,000 jobs gone in four months. Insolvencies at their highest since 2009. Mortgage delinquencies more than doubled since 2020. None of this is making the news.
Read →May 10, 2026
Lambeth lost a school in 2010. The City approved 31 townhouses where it stood.
Last June I wrote on my Substack about a rezoning application at 4402 Colonel Talbot Road. On November 12, 2025, the Planning and Environment Committee approved it five to nothing. Council carried the by-laws unanimously two weeks later. Here is what the City's own staff report says, what residents put on the public record, and the fifteen year arc that connects the closure of a Lambeth school in 2010 to 31 households on the same site in 2025.
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