Hey Londoners, it is time. We’ve had another One Of Those Weeks, as of course we always do, and I think we need to fall into some Fall traditions and embrace our fears. It’s October, a hair’s breadth from Thanksgiving (maple flavour), and there’s a chill in the air most mornings. And, we have a municipal election that’s making everyone’s hair stand on end - oh yes, you had better believe it.
I’m calling it: spooky season has begun.
Welcome to London Ontario Online News, where you know we’ve already refilled the candy bowl a couple of times, but we still left room for turkey1. Here in Canada’s London, we know how to party, even as the little chocolate bars get smaller and smaller, making it easier to justify eating several in one go2. This is your local news ROUNDUP, where - with help from supercool subscribers and sponsors - we equip you with useful information, in the public interest, to help you make good decisions as Londoners. Just don’t expect a good example. Eat your candy. You’re welcome.
And this is London, Ontario, where it’s pumpkin time! This story from Kendra Seguin at CBC London tells us the pumpkin patches are bursting with big, orange delights for us all to take home. I do love a nice Fall display. We all have our traditions and, as families gather this weekend, I’m sure we will all feel grateful and lucky, even as we drown out Uncle Dave’s opinions by loudly passing the gravy.
Anyway. That’s a different kind of scary.
Let’s progress.
Music to get the blood moving
Sometimes we get cultured round here. And this is a great way to kick off some antics as we approach the Gaelic festival of Samhain, marked for thousands of years3 in one way or another by people who should really know better than to give everyone a fright like this.
Ssssh! It’s midnight. Twelve chimes and all is… well?
(Click on a link and the music stops. It’s there for background and a bit of fun.)4
It is definitely time to share some news you can use. And there’s no better place to start than the election, which will be over two weeks from Monday, happily, when we can all get down to the Monster Mash instead.
Election 2026
Scared? Stick around and you might be. This week, mayoral challenger Susan Stevenson has been talking about change, and reviewing public spending, and firing people at City Hall - if she’s elected on October 26. There’s some trepidation in the air at 300 Dufferin, I am given to understand. You can read more, of course, in my Wednesday column here.
Meanwhile, incumbent Josh Morgan has been all business5 with an announcement to designed to help businesses. This CBC story and this LFP one have got the goods, and just know that Morgan pledged, if re-elected, to seek council approval for $60,000 to help launch a tariff advisory service for small and medium-sized businesses. He also promised zoning changes allowing low-risk home-based bakeries that meet public health requirements.
Downtown issues
I’m going to drop the Halloween nonsense for a bit because, unlike a number of Londoners, I am not afraid of our downtown.
This excellent story from Kate Dubinski at CBC London talks about a British initiative that brings landlords, businesses and community groups together to recruit tenants for empty storefronts. The reporting suggests it could offer a model for downtown London and Old East Village, where retail vacancy rates are 17 and 30% respectively.
Opinion alert: This looks like an amazing program and I’m sure it’s brought a lot of success to high streets (downtowns, kinda). And, I know from following UK news closely that nobody really has this problem solved. It’s a complicated socioeconomic issue, closely linked to poverty and the tough times people are experiencing, and it takes a village, or a city, to solve it.
It’s good to see the City of London starting with a strong downtown plan; CBC’s Andrew Lupton gave us a great scene-setter (here) back in June.
Idiot + chainsaw + hydro pole = BOOM
Ex-squeeze me? Somebody cut down a hydro pole with a chainsaw? Do they dislike living in civilization? Bloody hell6.
CTV London’s Sean Irvine reports:
This cut power to 1,300 hydro customers on Tuesday. The location is just off Exeter, near-ish to White Oaks Mall.
Let’s take a break for some Halloween fun.
Spirit Halloween stores and where to find them
If, like me, you’re one of those parents who likes to entertain the children by taking them to a store and not buying them anything, then perhaps you also have a wonderful family tradition of visiting a Spirit Halloween.
Each of these is a family-friendly Carnival of Souls but they’re never in the same place every year, are they? Like some ghostly village out of legend, they show up where they want and vanish again, leaving us pining for slightly-inappropriate horror-themed items until October returns like a fogbank full of zombie pirates.
Well, this year I’ve done the research for us all, and can confirm two locations in London:
611 Wonderland Rd. N., in the former Habitat Restore. That’s Wonderland and Oxford, right at the back of the plaza.
And 2209 Dundas St. E, waaaaaaay east in the old Peavey Mart, almost at Veterans.
You are most ghoulishly welcome. We visited the East London one and had an absolute blast. It’s worth knowing it’s probably too scary for little kids, but we made it through OK with some courage and teamwork, and perhaps a little misdirection away from the more adult displays. And this store has a big section full of animatronic horror that had us screaming almost immediately.
Good clean fun. ARGH.
Little bit more news.
Education and aviation
There’s been a welcome announcement in this sector, with a $34 million contract between Fanshawe College and the Royal Canadian Air Force.
That’s a video summary from Rogers, and here it is in text, from another point-of-view, as Innisfil Today covers the story that affects its local airbase, CFB Borden.
The gist of it is Fanshawe - so badly affected by cuts this past year-or-so - has a four-year, $34.4-million federal contract to provide aviation maintenance training to up to 282 RCAF students annually at CFB Borden, beginning in January. Students will earn recognized civilian credentials through accelerated programs, while the RCAF continues to provide military-specific instruction.
Homecoming draws 15,000
The police have released numbers from Western University’s Homecoming weekend. About 15,000 people joined the party, down from a peak of 18,000 two years ago.
If you want to read more, here’s a bit from CBC.
The Lightning Round
Five stories struck me this week.
More flights out of London - services to Vancouver, Edmonton, Halifax, Ottawa and Montreal from the spring: LINK.
A PSA from the fire department about battery safety: LINK.
Rogers tv on the unveiling of the Byron Springbank Veterans Monument: LINK.
A massive job fair attracted hundreds and provided an opportunity to mention A.I., which is on a lot of minds and devouring a lot of jobs: LINK.
And you can donate unwanted apparel to Koats For Kids, which gets coats to, er, kids. Here’s Rogers tv with a video about that worthy cause: LINK.
From The Loon
This week we’ve had Matt and Steve talking mayoral races on Monday, Cedric in SoHo on Tuesday, and Diana providing the second part of her Lara St. John interview yesterday.
Are you on a rooftop, white coat billowing as you rig electrical equipment to the weather vane? Then make sure your shambling laboratory assistant signs you both up for The Loon, and our new content every day. You don’t need to be a mad scientist to figure out this is a great deal at $10 a month, or free, for now.
Thanks to everybody who supports our local independent media company.
And finally…
Dragging the Halloween theme all the way to the end, like a struggling sack that just won’t go in the trunk, let’s spotlight (in orange light) a new book that’s set in our city.
Ed Seaward’s London Gothic follows a teenage girl seeking the truth about her mother’s disappearance amid family violence and secrets in 1970s and 1980s London, Ontario. Here’s a CBC story.
I love supporting local authors and will point out this one is having a book signing on Sunday, from 4:30 to 6 p.m. at The Space, 23 Heather Cres. (That’s near the big roundabout at Hale and Trafalgar.) The holidays are coming and we should really start picking up bits now. What better gift than a signed book?
Tell ‘em The Loon sent you.
Enough
Look out for ghosties and ghoulies, and long-leggety beasties, and things that go bump in the night - good Lord deliver us. The nights are drawing in and we’re looking to the end of the year and the winter to come.
And this spooky season we have an extra-frightening time, with all the news we can endure and an election lurking, somewhere in the darkness at the end of October.
But we know what to do, and we always have. We’ll show strength, act well, make good decisions and put a light in the window, metaphorically or otherwise. Keep a candle in your tumshie and make decisions in ways that help the people around you. Hold your loved ones close. Stick together and we’ll make it through to morning.
Hush, Vincent, we don’t need any more of your nonsense. It’s time for the long weekend.
Happy Thanksgiving!
- Mike
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Hey, can anyone else hear a chainsaw?
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And ham. Not in the candy bowl, though.
I regret nothing. I apologize for nothing.
Yes, really. There’s evidence from Neolithic times.
Alternative soundtrack, in case you want something smoother. Still fits the theme.
Do you see what I did there? This takes skill, you know.
‘Tis the season.
MASSIVE TRIGGER WARNING, even for the trailer, you guys.
I disagree with your conclusion that empty commercial and retail space is “a complicated socioeconomic issue, closely linked to poverty and the tough times people are experiencing, and it takes a village, or a city, to solve it.”
A lot of it, maybe most of it, is the result of a huge shift in the way people shop. Many don’t go to stores any more — they expect the store to come to them via an easy order-from-home portal and home delivery. Cities like London need to reimagine downtowns that aren’t built around commercial activity. And programs aimed at trying to help downtown businesses attract customers are, for the most part, a waste of taxpayers’ money.
The chainsaw story — like a banana thrown at a hockey game, a racial epithet hurled from a passerby toward a theatre artist, or the forcible removal of a hijab at a shopping centre — we must deal with our fair share of dumbassery.