By John Chenier
One victim of the pandemic is the familiar two-month listing and reviews of the shows coming to the ByTowne Cinema. Bruce White, the owner of the cinema, made the decision to cancel the publication in the summer. A couple of factors led to the decision to cease publishing the program. At the top of the list was the fact that the ByTowne was no longer able to get firm commitments from distributors as to what films would be available or when, so that Mr. White could produce a program. Another was that many of the places where the racks had been placed were either closed or open for take-out only. In short, there was no content for a program and few locations to display it.
But every cloud must have a silver lining. Mr. White offered the racks, free of charge, to community newspapers. The Echo managed to obtain 20 of these. The plan is that many of the racks will be shared with other community papers. For instance, the racks in the ByWard Market Building, the Rideau Street Loblaws and other locations along the Rideau corridor will be shared with the Sandy Hill IMAGE.
Hopefully similar arrangements can be made with the New Edinburgh News along with eastern fringe of the Echo circulation route for locations such as the seniors’ residence on Porter’s Island, the New Edinburgh Pharmacy and Beechwood Books.
The Echo will be looking to find homes for a dozen other racks in Lowertown once businesses return to normal.