🦃 The roundabout isn't dead. It's in line.

~ NOTL News Crew

Online voting has been open since Monday, and Wednesday's first advance poll at Town Hall was busier than some voters expected, with somewhere between 50 and 100 people through the door by 11am. One voter put it simply: "We are living in a dream here." Another said their vote was "more for correcting the path." That's NOTL in two sentences. Meanwhile, the social media rumour of the week (that the St. Davids roundabout was dead) turned out to be wrong, and the Lord Mayor had to say so in writing. And next Tuesday, a crew of Niagara College students will start raising the frame for a 16-foot sculpture of three women working a field on Niagara Stone Road, built to say thanks for the meal. Fitting timing. Happy Thanksgiving, NOTL.

Last Saturday, a Lord Mayor candidate posted on Facebook that the roundabout planned for the middle of St. Davids had been "terminated once and for all." By Monday afternoon, Lord Mayor Gary Zalepa had put out a written statement saying it hadn't. Since then, the candidate has corrected his post. In an election month, a roundabout became a news story about what's true.

So here's what's true.

What was planned. Niagara Region wants to replace the four-way intersection at York Road and Four Mile Creek Road, the heart of St. Davids, with a roundabout. Construction was supposed to start in summer 2027 and wrap that winter.

What changed. During its capital budget planning for next year, the Region pushed the project back a year. Its project page now shows construction starting summer 2028 and finishing in winter 2028. Zalepa's statement said the deferral lets "higher-priority infrastructure investments" go first, and that the project "has not been cancelled." The Town says design work and property discussions are still going.

What isn't delayed. The road reconstruction in front of St. Davids Public School goes ahead as planned. So does the work connecting sidewalks to the Cannery Park subdivision, including a new pedestrian crossing. If you walk your kids to school in St. Davids, that's the part of this story that affects you soonest.

Why people care so much. The roundabout has been controversial from the start. Critics worry it will hurt the businesses clustered around the intersection, change the look and feel of a historic village, and pull more traffic through it. The Region's case is safety: for drivers, for pedestrians and for cyclists at a busy, awkward intersection.

Where the candidates land. Vaughn Goettler, who made the original post, has since said the project was deferred, not cancelled, but added that he thinks a deferral likely means it won't happen, and that he'd like the Region to cancel it outright. Regional Coun. Andrea Kaiser, also running for Lord Mayor, confirmed Zalepa's account and offered a sharper word for it: "Delayed is a better word than deferred," she said, since the project has simply moved from one budget year to the next.

The bigger wrinkle. By the time construction is scheduled to start, the Region making the decision will look very different. The Province is shrinking regional council to 12 mayors plus an appointed chair, starting next month, with votes weighted by population. NOTL won't have its own regional councillor at the table anymore, only its Lord Mayor. And Zalepa, who isn't running again in NOTL, has applied to be that appointed chair.

That's the real takeaway. Whether St. Davids gets a roundabout in 2028 will be decided by a much smaller room than the one that approved it. If you have an opinion on it, the people asking for your vote right now are the ones who'll be carrying it into that room. Ask them.

Wednesday's in-person advance poll at Town Hall drew a steady crowd, with staff estimating 50 to 100 voters by late morning. Voters told Niagara Now they were weighing development, flooding, accessibility and the town-versus-rural divide. If you haven't voted yet: online voting is open until 8pm on Sunday, Oct. 25 (you'll need your Voter Information Letter), the next advance poll is Saturday, Oct. 17, 10am to 6pm at the Community Centre, and Election Day is Monday, Oct. 26. Missed the forums? The NOTLRA has posted all three (Lord Mayor plus both council nights) on its YouTube channel, @NOTL_RA, with transcripts at notlelection.ca. The Lord Mayor debate alone has over 1,400 views. One more thing worth knowing: Lord Mayor Gary Zalepa, who isn't seeking re-election, has applied to become Niagara's appointed regional chair.

Town Hall, the Operations Building, the Community Centre and the Public Library are all closed Monday, Oct. 12, and reopen Tuesday at 8:30am. The Meridian Credit Union Arena is open Monday for a public skate, 1:30 to 3pm. For road, water or bylaw emergencies over the long weekend, call 905-682-2704; animal control emergencies, 905-682-0767. And since it's Fire Prevention Week: keep the cornstalks, dried leaves and paper decorations away from candles and heaters, or better yet, switch to battery candles.

Early Wednesday morning, a vehicle heading east on Lakeshore Road left the road near the bend where it becomes Mary Street, went into a ditch, went airborne across Dorchester Street and hit the building at 333 Mary St., home to a travel agency, a bakery's office and three apartments. Two apartments were occupied; no one inside was hurt, and tenants have been relocated while an engineer checks the structure. The owner estimates about $120,000 in damage. The driver, a 27-year-old NOTL man, had non-life-threatening injuries and faces impaired and dangerous driving charges, according to Niagara Regional Police.

Twenty teams tore around town last weekend solving 25 clues (one sent people wading into Lake Ontario) in the fourth annual Road Rally for Red Roof Retreat. It raised $75,000, which will help finish the organization's new respite care facility on Concession 6 Road, part of a $4.3 million campaign, set to open in January 2027. "Events like this are letting us finish every detail," said founder Steffanie Bjorgan.

Remember Tim and Frances Price, the couple who gave $10 million to rebuild the Royal George and turned down the naming rights? They sat down with Niagara Now this week. Shaw-goers since 1980, they say they give to the arts because it's "the most vulnerable to pullback in funds." On the old theatre: "Everybody knew that it was old and dank and needed change." And on the local pushback over the teardown: "People don't like change, typically." The new theatre is expected to cost about $90 million and open in fall 2028.

The Niagara Regional Native Centre held its annual powwow last Saturday, organized this year by its youth under the theme "Nurturing Our Roots, Honouring Our Youth." Grand entry at noon, then dancing, food and craft vendors, with etiquette guidelines posted for first-timers. "The powwow is a deep place in connection," said youth co-ordinator Lou Davis. It's open to the public every year, and worth putting on your calendar for next fall.

It's Canadian Library Month, and the NOTL Public Library wants ideas for its Library of Things, the collection of non-book items you can borrow. Suggest something online or drop a ballot at the library by Oct. 31. The top ideas get added, and the winner gets first checkout.

In partnership with Evan McCaughey

Evan McCaughey works NOTL and the rest of Niagara with The Sykes Real Estate Team at RE/MAX Niagara. His motto is "Local expert. Proven results." If you've got a real estate question, he's an easy call.

130 John Street. An end-unit freehold townhome with 4 bedrooms, 4.5 bathrooms, an attached garage and a private fenced yard, a short walk from the lake, the shops, dinner and a tasting room.

Buying or selling in NOTL? Call or text Evan at 289-968-8128.

Last December, photographer Ron Planche was told he had about a year to live. Six weeks later, an MRI showed it was an infection, not a tumour. He spent the scare sorting a million negatives, and now the best of them hang in "60 Years in a Large Landscape" at the Niagara Pumphouse Arts Centre (247 Ricardo St.), Oct. 7 to 29 in the Hummel Family Room. His career includes Robert F. Kennedy in Fredericton in 1967 and the Queen Mother's Centennial visit to Saint John, the shot that became his front-page image. Can't make it this weekend? Come to the reception next Thursday, Oct. 15, 5 to 6:30pm.

Turkey's in the oven, the kids are bouncing off the walls, and Town Hall is closed. The Meridian Credit Union Arena in Virgil is open for a public skate Monday from 1:30 to 3pm. It's the easiest way to burn off a long weekend's worth of pie before dinner. Bring your own skates.

If you drive Niagara Stone Road between The Hare and Southbrook this fall, you're going to see three women rising out of a field, the tallest of them 16 feet high. They'll be there because Ron Clavier thought NOTL's farmers deserved a monument, and then spent more than ten years making it happen.

The project is called "Thanks for the Meal," a series of large outdoor installations honouring the people who have farmed this town and the history of how they did it. The first piece, "Three Sisters," was designed by Indigenous artists Raymond Skye and Shayde Sandy and draws on the story of how corn, beans and squash came to be grown together, each one helping the others thrive.

Getting here took some doing. In June 2025, Clavier asked council to exempt public art from the Town's ban on non-government roadside signs, and council agreed. The concrete bases went in on Sept. 3. Next Tuesday, Oct. 13, twelve Niagara College trades students will help raise the framing, with the artwork fitted on over the following weeks. The Burton Foundation chipped in $10,000 this summer. "It had been a long time coming," Clavier said.

He's not stopping at one. The next installation is planned for spring 2027, and he's floated pieces honouring Mennonite farmers, the Farmerettes and the British land grants that shaped the town. How many in total? He calls the possibilities "infinite."

There are worse ways to spend Thanksgiving week than watching a thank-you to farmers go up in a field.

Last week you said: We asked what you'd change about Queen Street. Tish V. had a clear answer: patios should be allowed, "if restaurants want to pay annually for the parking spots it would take up." Got a better idea? It's not too late. The Town's Queen Street plan is just getting started.

This week: It's Thanksgiving. What's the one thing about living in NOTL you're most thankful for this year? A place, a person, a neighbour, a Tuesday-morning ritual. Best answers run next week.

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