“The only reason I wear glasses is for little things. Like driving my car. Or finding it.” – Grandpa Jonesy
“What do you mean what’s it like to be in a coma? I hate to disappoint you but how am I supposed to know, dear? I was in a coma!” – Grandma Smithers
We’re still trying to figure out the route planner Peter Scholtens plans to take with his proposed $45 billion railway.
Scholtens wants to build it from scratch to go from Edmonton to the port of Anchorage, Alaska. There’s already a railway from Edmonton north to High Level. And already years of talk of a transportation corridor of some kind running from Fort McMurray through the Peace Country to Prince Rupert on the British Columbia coast.
Scholten’s plan is to bypass CN and CP and build an Indigenous and investor owned, rail system that would be used by many instead of just one big company. Trains would be run by different businesses. The rails themselves would be owned by the Scholten project.
It’s an ambitious undertaking. It looks like the main idea right now is getting grant money to explore the whole idea. That alone can be tens of millions of dollars. A business all by itself.
In any way possible, it’s hoped to take advantage of the massive amount of spending Prime Minister Mark Carney says he expects to spend in Canada on building up the Canadian military, and also the entire Canadian economy.
Maybe pie-in-the-sky ideas fit the bill here. Reports have been saying Carney’s ideas are a lot of talk but not much action. The so-called “Major Projects” people haven’t got one new project started that wasn’t already going before Carney came to office.
Defence spending? Submarines next year. Along with fighter jets. A bigger armed forces. Arctic infrastructure build out. New pipelines. All “coming.”
Now, if one was a Canadian bank and Carney came looking for a loan to finance even a small bit of the projects being talked about, we can tell you the answer right now: “We’ve got to look after grandma and grandpa’s money. Your projects are a tad too risky for us.”
Translation: “Go pound sand, Mr. Carney. With our protected status in Canada, and all the money we are making here, we’re expanding everywhere but Canada.”
Well, it’s still nice to know there are some people out there like Scholten with big ideas and big plans.
We thought the monsoon season in our part of the land is usually when July rolls around. So much for that thinking! Here it is almost mid-August and there is still lots of sprinkling.
Maybe it’s just the right amount of rain to keep crops and hay growing, but not quite enough to make it too hard to keep the yard and roads from getting out of control. But on that matter of sprinkling, it almost seems like those hazy, lazy days of summer, laying around catching rays and sipping on a cool beverage are behind us. Like, back at the end of May and beginning of June. And here it is barely three weeks or so from school starting and still no hot and dry spells.
So, we might be asking ourselves where oh where did summer go?
Not to worry. We got another couple of months to get through before we can really start complaining.
And on that topic of complaining, a news report says Saskatchewan has three of the top cities in Canada where renting is the cheapest: Regina, Saskatoon and Lloydminster.
Half the price or more than what rent costs in Toronto or Vancouver!
Of course, a lot of commenters on one news story were “but, but, what about the cold weather?” Seems saving enough on living costs to the tune of $20 or $30 thousand per year just isn’t enough for some people. You know, it costs a LOT to buy a decent parka, warm mitts and gloves, and a toque. Not to mention there’s nothing to do in winter. No suntanning. No beaches. No golf!
We guess for some people, whining about winter in the middle of summer is par for the course.
“There is one thing to be said about the price of homes in Toronto or Vancouver, or so many communities right near them. Inflation has allowed everybody there to live in a more expensive neighbourhood without having to move.” – Richard Needham
Data centres are the new “smoke stacks” in Canada. Remember when most everybody used to want industry in their part of the land? Jobs and help pay taxes for all kinds of amenities like arenas, parks, and swimming pools.
Now, everybody wants a data centre, right?
Well, not so fast! It seems data centres are almost as popular in some parts as wind or solar farms, nuclear power plants, or pipelines. Some people are all in favour of anything that creates jobs and promises to pay taxes.
And others are just plain dead against. On data centres, of all the plants proposed across Canada, one report says 98 per cent are proposed in Alberta. Locations already include Wheatland County east of Calgary, Olds, the M.D. of Opportunity, Heartland just north of Edmonton, Rocky Mountain House, and Kevin O’Leary’s Wonder Valley south of Grande Prairie.
That Olds proposal is for a $10 billion plant inside the town borders! That plan was shot down earlier this year when put before the Alberta government. Apparently, lack of details including nothing about where the electricity to operate was coming from killed it.
But now – apparently – it is back on the burner. There is already a multitude of objections coming from locals in Olds. Mostly, “too big” is the problem.
No matter what happens in Olds, we expect to hear a lot more about data centres everywhere in the province.