Categories
Brampton Transit Urban Planning

What’s going on in Downtown Brampton?

Two years ago, Metrolinx started buying up properties in Downtown Brampton in order to build a new surface parking lot for GO Transit commuters. Now more houses are boarded up, and there are plans for a new university campus.

Categories
Roads Toronto Walking

Pedestrian flags at crosswalks are not a solution

Pedestrian crossing in Dartmouth Nova Scotia equipped with pedestrian flags A Toronto Star article this weekend profiled three elementary school students installing pedestrian flags at local residential intersections near their school in Leaside. Pedestrian flags are not a new idea; they have been common in Halifax and other communities in Nova Scotia for several years. (I […]

Categories
Roads Toronto Walking

The wrong answer to a tragic death of a boy walking home from school

Kennedy Public School, where 11-year old Duncan Xu was in Grade 6. He was struck and killed on an adjacent residential street while walking home on Tuesday, February 27.  On Tuesday, February 27, around 3:30 PM, Duncan Xu, an 11-year old boy, was struck and killed by a motorist in a residential neighbourhood in north […]

Categories
Cycling Politics Roads Toronto Urban Planning Walking

The John Tory Way

Yonge Street looking south from Richmond Hill There’s an episode of The Simpsons where Homer Simpson changes his name to Max Power, after he’s ridiculed for sharing the name with a buffoonish television character. It’s not a great episode — it came out at the time the show was in transition from its glory years […]

Categories
Development History Ontario Urban Planning

Ontario’s failed downtown malls

The Toronto Eaton Centre, large, famous, and vital, is only one of many malls built in the downtown cores of Ontario cities between the 1960s and 1990s. From Thunder Bay to Cornwall, the construction of new enclosed shopping centres were seen as a necessary tool to keep the old city centres vibrant and relevant in […]

Categories
Election Maps Politics Toronto

Mapping Toronto’s approved new ward boundaries

On Monday, October 22, 2018, Torontonians will be electing a new city council. And for the first time since 2000, Toronto’s ward boundaries will be changing. When the new council is formed on December 1, 2018, there will be 47 wards, up from 44. Downtown Toronto will gain three new seats, and North York will gain […]

Categories
Toronto Walking

The same tired pedestrian safety campaign ignores the real issues

After five pedestrians were killed on Toronto’s streets during the two weeks of 2018, Toronto Police have announced another pedestrian safety campaign promising increased enforcement and education efforts. Sadly, I do not have faith that the local police service will properly address the safety of vulnerable road users. Police are once again advising pedestrians to avoid […]

Categories
Brampton History Maps Transit

Brampton Transit’s evolution from a laggard to a leader

For TVO this week, I discuss Brampton Transit’s impressive ridership growth. In the last five years, Brampton Transit has bucked the trend of stagnant ridership numbers encountered elsewhere in the Greater Toronto Area and North America in general. I argue that Brampton’s success in improving transit ridership comes from sustained investment over many years, the […]

Categories
Politics Transit

King Street complainers need to remember why they’re on King Street

On Friday, CBC Toronto ran a story on several King Street West businesses that have claimed that the new King Street Pilot have caused them to lose customers in December.  The three business owners mentioned in the article were Laleh Larijani of Forno Cultura, a bakery on King east of Bathurst, and two Restaurant Row restaurateurs: […]

Categories
About me

A farewell to 2017

At the top of the Franey Trail, Cape Breton National Park For me, 2017 was a great year. In June, I wrote about my life up to that point, looking back at some of the challenges I faced over the years, my ability to overcome them, and my accomplishments. I wrote that shortly before I […]