Categories
Infrastructure Roads Toronto Transit

A little more coordination, please?

Getting around Downtown Toronto can be an exercise in frustration, whether you drive, bike, take transit, or drive. Though necessary transit and road construction projects are the cause of much of the congestion, driver behaviour, poor management, and a lack of coordination between various municipal and provincial agencies have only added to the traffic quagmire. […]

Categories
Cycling Infrastructure Politics Roads Urban Planning Walking

Bloor Street blues

The Bloor Street redesign is the right thing to do for a safer and more inclusive city. Mississauga is growing up. Some of its politicians should too.

Categories
History Roads Toronto

The continuing history of Dundas Street

Nearly three years ago, I wrote about the complicated history of Toronto’s Dundas Street. Calls to rename the street, which honours Henry Dundas, 1st Viscount Melville, came during a time of reckoning in Canada and the United States with racism, colonialism, and our ongoing relationships with First Nations. Ryerson University (my alma mater) changed its […]

Categories
Roads Toronto Transit Urban Toronto

Bussing the gap: Scarborough transit after the SRT

On July 24, 2023, 38 years of Line 3, the Scarborough RT, came to an ignoble end when a car came off the tracks just south of Ellesmere Station, four months ahead of the scheduled closure of the deteriorating line. Though the City of Toronto and the Toronto Transit Commission (TTC) were hesitant to say […]

Categories
Roads Toronto Transit Walking

Make streetcars king once more

On Tuesday, November 28, the University of Toronto’s School of Cities released their report that looked at vehicle movement and traffic violations on the King Street Transit Priority Corridor. They found that there are, on average, 6,800 illegal turns and through movements at intersections on the corridor, and less than 0.3% of offenders are stopped by […]

Categories
Roads Transit

GO’s gaping gap, gone

My experiences riding the new GO Transit Route 17, and thoughts on improving Route 21

Categories
Infrastructure Roads Transit Travels Urban Planning

Montreal: a tale of two busways

Across Canada, our biggest cities are building new transit. Here in Toronto, the Crosstown and Finch West LRTs are well underway (though the first phase of the Eglinton-Crosstown is already three years late), as well as the Scarborough subway expansion, the Ontario Line, and GO Transit corridor improvements. Vancouver is building a major expansion to […]

Categories
Cycling History Infrastructure Roads Toronto Walking

The jarring streetscape of Jarvis Street

Over a century ago, Jarvis Street was Toronto’s most fashionable address, and home to prominent families including the Masseys, who made their wealth from the farm equipment industry, and whose names live on through Massey Hall, Hart House, the Fred Victor Mission, and Massey College. The wide boulevards allowed for lush street trees to flourish, […]

Categories
Infrastructure Maps Ontario Politics Roads Toronto Transit

GO Transit is broken – and other transit updates

GO Transit is broken. So far, I have seen no initiative from Metrolinx or any level of government to fix it. That should outrage all of us.

Categories
Roads Toronto Urban Planning Walking

Deadly by design: Warden and Comstock

On Thursday, July 21, 2022, at 3:10 PM, a 38-year-old man was standing at a street corner in Scarborough, waiting for a signal to safely cross to the other side. Before he even had the chance to enter the intersection of Warden Avenue at Comstock Road, a driver of a 2009 silver Kia minivan heading south […]