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About me Toronto Transit

Toronto’s Transit Secrets

Earlier this week, I attended a book launch at the Spacing Store at 401 Richmond Street West here in Toronto. While I have been to numerous book launches, often to support friends and colleagues, it was the first time it was for a book that I contributed to. As some of you may know, I […]

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Ontario Politics

Where, exactly, is Northern Ontario?

The French River at Highway 69, where Northern Ontario truly begins Last week, the leaders of the three major provincial parties (Liberals, Progressive Conservatives, and the New Democrats) met in Parry Sound, at a debate dedicated to issues specific to Northern Ontario. It was the second of three debates scheduled ahead of the June 7, […]

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Brampton Development Infrastructure Ontario Urban Planning

A tale of two university campuses

Site of Brampton’s new Ryerson/Sheridan campus Last week, the provincial government announced two new post-secondary educational campuses in Toronto’s fast-growing western suburbs, due to open in 2022. Wilfrid Laurier University will be partnering with Conestoga College on a new facility in Milton. Brampton will be getting a new Ryerson University campus in partnership with Sheridan […]

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Brampton Cycling Parks Walking

Brampton’s multi-use path problems

Recreational Trail: no loitering Brampton, my hometown, has a great network of parks, many of which are connected by multi use paths that follow local waterways like the West Humber River and Etobicoke Creek. In suburban neighbourhoods where curvilinear street networks and cul-de-sacs predominate, these paths are necessary as shortcuts for pedestrians and cyclists, and […]

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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 […]

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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 […]

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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 […]

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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 […]

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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 […]